Catalogue > At random

The shadow of a tall and hunched man moves around a labyrinthine apartment full of bookcases, video tapes and plastic bags like a modern Max Schreck who is restlessly looking for something that has been lost forever. The mystery and melancholy from Murnau’s vampire classic is preserved in John Skoog’s interpretation of « Nosferatu », which is a (self-)portrait of the Swedish « outsider artist » Richard Vogel, with whom Skoog has created his latest film work. A film that gives a new meaning and dignity to the concept of Scandinavian Expressionism by being filmed on an antiquated video format and copied from an antique video projector, whose three colours constantly threaten to dissolve the porous picture into a vacuum of abstraction. The recently deceased Vogel was a close friend of Skoog’s family, but lived a quiet life dedicated to accumulating hours of videotaped television shows and almost aggressively meaningless own projects, which in an almost lexical fashion document the welfare state’s invisible corners and waste products in countless works.

In his films, videos, and photography John Skoog combines research into history and everyday life with a poetic and fictional atmosphere that is grounded in the film and literary traditions. His work explores social contexts of individuals and communities; unpacking their complex relationship to collective rituals and historical forces, as well as to existential and natural scenarios of transition. Skoog’s works make clear references to mythological iconography; they remind us of the profane origins of myth and in this way they aim to demystify both nature and society.