Liberty: an ephemeral statute (2020, Belgium, UK, 37’, super 8 transferred to digital file)

Stemming from a personal account of a search for liberation set in the US during the early 70s as well as Chantal Akerman's News from Home (1977), Liberty: an ephemeral statute reflects upon post-68 desires for emancipation, emigration, and education through an impressionistic memoir and portrait of the filmmaker’s mother back home in Scotland today.

Barefoot Birthdays on Unbreakable Glass (2024, Belgium, 18’, 16 mm transferred to digital file)

Three women reflect on art creation, immigration, and their own mother-daughter relationships: relationships cut short, relationships evolving, relationships to treasure. Following insights of independent experiences of love and loss, they unite in one space to celebrate a new chapter of life and friendship.

Against the Current (2024-, sketch for upcoming portrait on Camilla Collett. 4:23')

Against the Current (2024-) steps inside Eidsvoll’s public library to seek out the legacy of Norway’s pioneering feminist writer and women’s rights activist Camilla Collett (1813–1895). In conversation with the local librarian, it reflects on Collett’s enduring influence in her hometown and the continuing need for feminist voices today, highlighting the library as both a sanctuary of learning and a vital democratic space.

Conversation between Rebecca Jane Arthur and Silja Espolin Johnson, including a reading from BE GOOD, IF YOU CAN’T BE GOOD, BE GOOD AT IT Boom Boom Boom Boom (red: Rebecca Jane Arthur and Eva Giolo, 2021)

Rebecca Jane Arthur (Edinburgh, 1984) is an artist and filmmaker based in Brussels. Working predominantly with the moving image and text, she often departs from personal stories that highlight socio-political contexts and histories, and gives particular attention to class politics, education and women’s experiences. She has written extensively on her filmmaking process and on the relationship between writing and image-making. She is co-founder of the artist-run production and distribution platform elephy; artistic doctoral researcher at KASK & Conservatorium/School of Art Gent, where she teaches in the visual arts department and lectures on feminist theory; and contributor to the online film criticism platformSabzian. Arthur is currently part of the artist residency Elasticityhosted by PRAKSIS, Oslo.

BE GOOD, IF YOU CAN’T BE GOOD, BE GOOD AT IT Boom Boom Boom Boom

Publication by Rebecca Jane Arthur & Eva Giolo, 312 pages, color print, English and French, 2021. Graphic design by Caroline Wolewinski.

The book is composed of letters, facsimiles and film stills: traces of the creative process. The artists Rebecca Jane Arthur and Eva Giolo bring together their correspondence on the act of writing and the act of filmmaking, in all its complexity, struggles and playfulness. The letters unpack themes as the challenge of making personal work and the strength found in sharing vulnerability; the act of writing itself, language and translation; writing on moving images, on their practices and that of others; and the notion of a place as a container of memories, of interiority and the confrontation with home. The publication acts as a negative to the films that they create, revealing that which cannot be seen.

Foran hver utgave av Kunstnerportrettet vil vi presentere et kapittel i En fire finger ting i seg selv, en animasjonsfilm av kunstner Tarje Eikanger Gullaksen som for anledningen presenteres i fem deler. Filmen handler om forholdet mellom ånden og hånden og er inspirert av et tilfeldig sammenstøt mellom karakteren Ting i Addams Family og Emmanuel Kants erkjennelsesfilosofi.

"Kan vi tenke oss kunst uten at noe her er kunstig, uten kunstig åndedrett, kunstig befruktning, kunstig moral, kunstig intelligens?. Jeg hvisket dette ut i verden, smilte, følte meg både genial og tullete. Kjente smaken av en mangel, en slags håndsåpenbaring som sakte krøp opp i kroppen fra grunnen, gjennom tærne, opp leggen, forbi lysken. Den gravde seg inn i magen som en tung knyttneve. Jeg måtte lete etter en måte å få åpnet hånden, så den kunne massere tarmen, løsne flokene. Når håndfastheten endelig slapp og flyten vendte tilbake, kunne jeg se at det kun var styrken på lyset fra mangelerklæringen som virkelig telte. En, to, tre, fire…"

Tarje Eikanger Gullaksen er utdannet ved Kunstakademiet i København og har vist sine verker på steder som Kunstnerforbundet (Oslo), Hermetiske Skygger (Oslo), Oplandia Senter for samtidskunst (Lillehammer), UKS (Oslo), VEDA (Firenze), Etablissement d’en face(Brussel), Krome Gallery (Berlin), Sprengel Museum (Hannover) og Artspeak (Vancouver).

Before each edition of the screening series on artist portriats we will present an episode of artist Tarje Eikanger Gullaksen's animated choir work A four finger thing in itself (2025). An animation about the relationship between the spirit and the hand, inspired by a chance collision between the character Thing from The Addams Family and Immanuel Kant’s theory of knowledge.

Gullaksen was educated at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts in Copenhagen and has exhibited her works in venues such as Kunstnerforbundet (Oslo), Hermetiske Skygger (Oslo), Oplandia Center for Contemporary Art (Lillehammer), UKS (Oslo), VEDA (Florence), Etablissement d’en face (Brussels), Krome Gallery (Berlin), the Sprengel Museum (Hanover), and Artspeak (Vancouver).