Portrait Mode [Oslo #1], 2011
found garment in wooden frame
80 x 60 x 3.5 cm / 31.5 x 23.62 x 1.57″

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Portrait Mode [Oslo #2], 2011
found garment in wooden frame
80 x 60 x 4.5 cm / 31.5 x 23.62 x 1.97″

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Portrait Mode [Oslo #6], 2011
found garment in wooden frame
121 x 147 x 6 cm / 57.87 x 47.64 x 2.36″

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Portrait Mode, 2011
found garments, oak frame and plexiglass

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Portrait Mode, 2011
exhibition view at Kunstall Chartlottenborg, Copenhagen

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Tragedy, 2011, persian rug, dog hair
exhibition view at Kunstall Chartlottenborg, Copenhagen

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The Demonstrators (Sinking Bulb), 2011
poster, stock image framed
52 x 68 cm / 20.47 x 26.77″

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The Demonstrators (Broken Rope), 2011
poster, stock image framed

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The Demonstrators, 2011
installation view at Kunstall Chartlottenborg, Copenhagen

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The Demonstrators (Drowning Coins), 2011
car tire (Hankook Radial 884), rubber covered steel chain, stock image poster
237 x 0 cm Ø 55cm / 93.31″

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The Demonstrators (Drowning coins), 2011
trapezes, rope, stock image posters
exhibition view at Standard, Oslo

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Modify, as needed, 2011
installation view, MoCA, Miami

all images courtesy of the artist, Kunstal Charlottenborg, Copenhagen and Standard, Oslo

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Portrait Mode (2011) and The Demonstrators (2011) are two recent series by Danish artist NINA BEIER mainly composed with framed works and sculptures exploring the idea of display; and in particular the slippery relationship between the sign and what it signifies, between the messenger and the message.

The Demonstrators follow a simple principle of hanging posters dipped in glue to dry on objects, as one would leave a towel out to dry. The drying process joins the two objects in an inseparable union, generating something like a wet t-shirt effect. The images on the posters are selected from photographs available from image banks. The objects all come from discount and department stores. The marriage between these two products, brings out the objecthood of the poster and the emblematic aspect of the object – as the object might be read as a symbolic attribution to the content of the poster or conversely the poster reduced to a draping to the object.

Portrait Mode is made from secondhand clothes featuring animal prints of all kinds – leopard spot jackets, zebra stripe trousers or snakeskin skirts – that are spread out and pressed within glass frames. This lush, colourful work initially suggests the vibrant patterns of an Op Art piece, or the bravado of an AbEx painting.

And good news: these series are actually on view at Kunstall Chartlottenborg (Copenhagen) until December 31, 2011

Stay on WFW and read more about NINA BEIER

all images found via Contemporary Art Daily