Johanna Billing: This Is How We Walk On The Moon
Collective Gallery
Edinburgh, UK
2 June – 14 July 2007

by Tonya Warner

The first thing that struck me upon returning to the Collective Gallery on my recent visit back to Edinburgh was its utter emptiness – what could be considered the main gallery space was barren except for a makeshift stage that, I was informed, is now used for musical performances. Albeit, I did return the next day to see Randan Discotheque perform his mix of self deprecating and political songs on acoustic guitar to a packed crowd. Still, to venture into the gallery during the day is very underwhelming. The only work on show when I visited was a video piece by Swedish artist Johanna Billing, who had been living in Edinburgh and participating in the Collective’s One Mile programme. Billing is known for filming people working collectively in activities that require a great deal of concentration, which seems to fit well with the Collective’s penchant for videos of unextraordinary experience – I am immediately reminded of last year’s festival exhibition, featuring Matt Stokes’s video of Northern Soul dancing.

The video, entitled “This Is How We Walk On The Moon,” after the song by 80s experimental musician Arthur Russell, features local musicians learning to sail on the Firth of Forth, to the soundtrack of their interpretation of the title song. The longer you watch the video, the more you observe a simplistic beauty to it, although at the same time you are waiting for something to happen – but, of course, nothing ever does. The way it is edited, one gets the impression that sailing involves constant rope pulling and a group of people who are only interacting with one another as if cogs in a machine. It is clear how much this is staged as the people working collectively seemingly refuse to speak to one another or show any amount of emotional reaction to their experience.

I understand that in the post-neo-conceptual art scene that rules Edinburgh, there is a certain attraction to simple, understated human activities that hold no underlying grand theories – a lowest common denominator, anyone can appreciate it approach. However, that does not keep me from feeling this piece is a bit pointless. I think it is the result of over thinking how one can try to turn conventions of the current art world on its head by returning to basic human interaction – see Rirkrit Tiravanija’s dinner parties. This intentional rejection of theory, raising mundane acts to the status of art, comes across as pretentious more than anything. Not a documentary and not quite a performance, Billing’s film is nice to watch and beautiful to listen to, but is it really art? Or, more importantly, does it really deserve to exclusively occupy a gallery space that could be used for so much more?

http://www.collectivegallery.net/

http://www.makeithappen.org/johannabilling.html

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