Clemens von Wedemeyer

Clemens von Wedemeyer works as an artist with the media Video and film. His oeuvre ranges between documentaries and feature films, reality and fiction. Within that overlapping artistic zone, von Wedemeyer explores the complexity of locations in the context of their temporal and spatial systems. The many facets of his work are reflected in the installations and photographs which accompany, enhance and expand his cinematic pieces and open multiple levels of perception. At the same time, von Wedemeyer focuses on the fundamental questions of representation as expressed in film and its alternative forms which he extends, distorts and visualises: the cinema is opened, the projection screen becomes transparent as the seam between the auditorium and backstage. The viewers themselves also serve as extras: Are we just the audience, or are we already part of the performance?

In 2012, von Wedemeyer gained international renown with Muster his contribution to dOCUMENTA (13) where he staged the diverse history of the former convent Breitenau near Kassel as a prison, a concentration camp and finally a reformatory on three projection screens, working with various film levels. The triangular installation enables the clips to intertwine and intermingle. In addition to Rushes (2012) or Big Business (2002), it is works like Rush (2008) or Basler Podest (2006) which allow the backstage area (as a place behind-the-scenes) to become a setting of ambivalence and unexpected turns. On the other hand, in Sun Cinema (2010), the screen is regarded as a projection screen to mirror cultural and social locations. Von Wedemeyer repeatedly uses the making-of as a means to tap further documentary and temporal levels. In the science fiction film Esiod 2015 (2016), the future of banks is staged as an almighty database for memories and relationships, thus referring to contemporary social networks and their economic potential. In his latest film Square, that was shot specifically for the exhibition on the platform of the Hamburger Kunsthalle, he documents a new view of motion patterns.

The accompanying and expanded catalogue sums up the Affected Places in chapters: 1. Screen, 2. Data Bank, 3. Church, Prison, Museum and 4. Backstage, thus mirroring the topics of the exhibition.

Clemens von Wedemeyer was born in Göttingen in 1974. He lives and works in Berlin and Leipzig where he has been a professor of Media Art at Leipzig’s Academy of Visual Arts  since 2013. Von Wedemeyer first studied Photography and Media Art in Bielefeld and then Art in Leipzig as a master student of Astrid Klein until 2005.

In addition to participating in various film festivals, such as the Moscow Biennale (2005), the skulptur projekte Münster 07 (2007) or dOCUMENTA 13 (2012) in Kassel, he has been honoured with several significant solo exhibitions, for example: at PS1 MoMA, New York (2006), the Barbican Centre London (2009), MAXXI, Museo nationale delle arti del XXI secolo, Rome (2013), MCA Chicago (2015) and Neuer Berliner Kunstverein (2016).