Jorinde Voigt
7/07

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Jorinde Voigt lives and works in Berlin. She graduated from the Visual Culture Studies School in Berlin in 2004, and from the Royal College of Art in London in 2001. Voigt produces sophisticated ink drawings that are in fact complex algorithms charting natural phenomena in combination with pop culture elements. These elements, combined with familiar logos, often stand for specific social groups. Performances, or rather, an interactive process that sometimes accompanies these algorithms directs gallery-goers to carry out prescribed tasks related to the work. Voigt's pieces combine a science-like statistical approach to physical phenomena with imaginary possibilities and daily occurrences. The results, presented under a mantle of the seemingly objective, mathematical seriousness of physics, climate science and sociology, are in fact playful and extremely suggestive.
Jorinde Voigt stayed at the JCVA over July 2007, along with fellow JCVA resident  from Berlin, Ralf Ziervogel. During her stay, she met gallery directors and other art professionals, and saw the culminating show of the Bachelors of Fine Arts students at the Bezalel Academy of Art and Design. She took several local tours including one of the walls of Jerusalem's Old City, and a day trip to the Dead Sea. Voigt termed her stay in Jerusalem extremely moving, and produced several new drawings here; these are on view in her solo exhibition Konglomerat, which opened in Cologne at the end of August 2007.
Two people kissing


This project, wherein Voigt researches how interactions between different natural and physical phenomena affect human behavior, uniquely combines ink drawings on paper with an interactive action. The drawings are presented as algorithms computing how temperature, duration and pop songs affect a kissing couple, and vice versa: how the fact of the kiss affects the surrounding temperature, music and more. The performance connected to these drawings turns the gallery into Voigt's personal lab. This kissing laboratory explores – like the drawings – the effects of kissing on physical parameters, and the effects of these parameters on a kiss. Gallery visitors are instructed to kiss for a certain amount of time, bringing to life the action and graph the drawings have already captured. 

The inspiration for this work is everyday life. In her Tales from the Travel Journal Vol.I, Voigt relates that she saw a couple kissing in the Tiergarten in Berlin, and noticed a sudden change in their behavior when the pop songs playing on the radio changed. This is the kind of moment Voigt looks for. She uses one of the most emotional and sensual acts in the human repertoire and turns it to a mechanical drawing reflecting data and probabilities. The outcome is visually abstract, and most appealing.
 
Untitled (1-14)

This work is a drawing in 14 parts, each a detail in an evolving narrative of an imaginary interaction between dropping temperatures, pop music, a couple kissing and satellite signals. It must be noted that every element charted here has duration. The temperature changes gradually from 0°C to -128°C.  Sets of pop songs then enter the narrative, affecting the temperature and affected by it. The temperatures drop further to -273°C, which is 0 Kelvin (k),  the coldest temperature possible in the universe. At that point, a kissing couple enters the equation, bringing along its own set of effects. A Medium Earth Orbit Satellite (orbiting at an altitude of 10,000 km.) now sends signals, changing the temperatures again. The process starts over again as soon as it reaches its end. Voigt's drawings reach for infinity and dwell on cycles.