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Loulou Cherinet, Minor Field Studies, 2004 © Loulou Cherinet. Video, double projection 10 min DVD loop

Loulou Cherinet

Loulou Cherinet turns roles and ideas on their heads in her works, frequently by combining two contrary positions or viewpoints so that the overall image becomes more complex. She creates a sense of displacement by shifting an event into a different context. Her works frequently have a documentary character and reflect in various ways on preconceived ideas, prejudices and clichés by giving prominence to the gaze of the outsider.

The photographic suite White Man Series shows a white man among blacks in Ethiopia. Here it is he – the symbol of Western dominance and the white male gaze – who represents the exotic.

The starting-point for Minor Field Studies is an anthropological study filmed along the border between Congo-Brazzaville and Cameroon. Cherinet translates the depictions of the settings in the filmed study into their Swedish counterparts in a Stockholm suburb. Double projection allows for a comparison of the similarities and disparities between the subject matter in both films.

The powerfully symbolic and associative work on video Bleeding Men I presents a staged setting of a self-destructive ritual. A few men cut their arms in such a way that the blood drips slowly, forming pools on the white-tiled floor. Among the issues raised by the film are social acceptance and belonging.

While the situations in Cherinet’s works are staged, her actors always play themselves. The astonished viewer is confronted with his or her own prejudices when what is expected fails to occur.

Loulou Cherinet

Born 1970 in Gothenburg.
Lives and works in Stockholm.

Education

2001–2005
Kungl. Konsthögskolan/ Royal University College of Fine Arts, Stockholm

1996–2000
Addis Ababa University School of Fine Art and Design, Addis Abeba [ET]

Selected solo exhibitions

2005
Videostaffet, Gävle Konstcentrum, Gävle.

2004
Dandelion, Halle für kunst Lüneburg, Lüneburg

2000
Loulou Cherinet at Asni, Asni Gallery, Addis Ababa [ET]

Selected group exhibitions

2005
Africa Remix, Centre Georges Pompidou. Musée National d’Art Moderne, Paris [FR]

2004
On Reason and Emotion, Biennale of Sydney, Sydney [AU]

2003
Next Flag, Migros Museum, Zürich [CH]

Selected bibliography

Loulou Cherinet, “A story has no beginning or end”, The African Sniper Reader, Zürich 2005.

Simon Njami, “A young woman in pursuit of the absolute”, Reasonemotion, Biennale of Sydney (utst.kat./exh. cat.), 2004.

John Peter Nilsson, ”Fortfarande vet han inte vart hon tog vägen”, Aftonbladet, 2002-08-02.

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