Talk

Academy Lectures: Camille Norment

Multi-media artist Camille Norment represented Norway in the 56^th Venice Biennial of Art (2015), with a three-part project that included a large-scale sound and sculptural installation, a publication series, and a sonic performance series.

Norment’s artwork often uses the notion of cultural psychoacoustics as both an aesthetic and conceptual framework. She defines this term as the investigation of socio-cultural phenomena through sound and music, particularly instances of sonic and social dissonance, and sound as a force over the body, mind, and society. Utilizing forms including sound, installation, drawing, and performance, she applies this concept towards the creation of critical artworks that are preoccupied with the way in which form, space, and the body of the viewer create experience. Shaping experiences that are both somatic and cognitive, the work engages the viewer as physical and psychological participant.

While highly concerned with aesthetic experience, the work simultaneously spans the thresholds of the social and the political, often utilizing specific cultural symbols as ‘quiet’, but potent elements in the work. Her investigations do not reflect the boundaries of a singular cultural agenda or perspective, but rather the latent, continual dialogs, intersections, and contradictions from various social realms. As such, a singular element specifically charged in one context is expanded to reveal a macrocosm of inter-contextual narratives.

The performance ensemble Camille Norment Trio, is comprised primarily of hardingfele, electric guitar, and glass armonica. Each of these instruments was once banned in fear of the psychological, social, or sexual power their sound was thought to have over the body, and the challenge they represented to social control.

In 2016, Norment produced artworks and performances for the venues including the Montréal Biennial and the Koch-Muziris Biennial in India, premiered a new drawing series in the Pushkin Museum in Moscow, produced a solo exhibition and new composition for performance in the Festspillene Festival in Bergen, and a commissioned performance for the Armory in New York amongst other new contributions.

A recent span of her extensive international exhibition, performance, and permanent public artwork credits also includes: Jazzhouse, Copenhagen (2016); Lisboa Soa (2016); an outdoor surround sound broadcast feature at Art Basel Miami (2015); Ultima Contemporary Music Festival (2015); exhibition and performance in the Museum of Modern Art, New York (2013); a commissioned artwork and performance for the Museum of Contemporary Art, Oslo (2012); Henie Onstad Art Center (2011 permanent sound installation); Liste Young Art Fair (2009); and the Thessaloniki Biennial, Greece (2007). Norment’s work has been written about in periodicals such as Art Forum, Art in America, The New York Times, Kunst Kritikk, Aftenposten, featured in The Wire Magazine, and numerous other international texts. Camille Norment has been featured in several recordings and her work has been broadcast in radio features including NPR in the U.S., Norway's NRK radio, and the UK's BBC.

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Academy Lectures features key speakers and positions in contemporary art and culture. It was initiated and first organized by professor Susanne M Winterling. Emphasizing dialogue, the Academy of Fine Art reaches to a public inside and outside the Academy.

Upcoming: 22/3 Mieke Bal, 18/5 Fred Dewey