++++ Colours give nourishment to certain expectations. A yellow turning gradually to red on a poster already says everything. No, it says, I am announcing an exciting event; look somewhere else if you are not a fan of oldie hit parades. Brown lines on light blue, on the other hand, signal avant-garde. This can be advertising for a tour of the art academy or for a trendy boutique.
The same thing holds true of typography. A typewriter font probably announces a post-modern play. Small block letters signify youth — it's probably a matter of pop music. Then there are other graphic elements which fill the space like writing, all of them criteria which influence the perception of a poster. Mostly you are not surprised.
Lise Harlev is involved with language and she thinks about identity. That is an obvious choice because the Danish artist, who was born in Odense be in 1973, attended the Frankfurt Städel School as a guest student in 1999 and 2000. Presumably she was confronted subliminally with certain expectations there, even though they could never be concretely specified.
Frequently you are not in the position to view things neutrally. When people like us hear or see the word "rotten", we think of something negative, quite automatically. Lise Harlev thought it must mean something like "great". When you look at her posters which can be seen currently at the Frankfurt Kunstverein as her contribution to Manifesta, at first you think about cultural discussion meetings, an electronic music concert or a sophisticated scholarly compact seminar about structural interferences in the work of X.
And these associations are not completely amiss. Lise Harlev wanted her posters to look like typical art biennial posters. "Do you believe that your nationality influences how the public receives and classifies your work in the context of international art?", Lise Harlev asks her colleagues in black capitals on a green background. Or, "Do you believe that your participation in an international art biennial has an effect on the way the public sees your home country?"
These are questions which concern not only the artists, but also our own receptive behaviour. Do we look for melancholy in Finnish works? Do we read signs of rebellion against dictatorship into Romanian works? What do we expect from a biennial called Manifesta from which participant, and from which country?
Lise Harlev has printed some answers from artists on her posters, statements which you can then compare with your own views. For instance, "Normally works from exotic countries attract more attention." Is that really the case?
Lise Harlev entices viewers with colours, typefaces, forms. Expecting a banal announcement, the viewer falls into the trap and suddenly has to examine his or her own prejudices. Manifesta is a good occasion for doing so.
The posters of Lise Harlev can be seen at the Frankfurt Kunstverein, Am Römerberg (Markt 44) until the end of Manifesta on 25 August. ani