Juha Laatikainen & Konsta Ojala

Domestic Panda

In a way the panda bear is much better of in a zoo. He has a simple job (being cute), and gets paid in bamboo every end of the day and everyone is extremely delighted if he gets laid. In it’s own habitat the panda bear eats some type of bamboo, which only fills up this hu…ge animal when eaten in very large quantities – such large quantities that the panda bear has a hard time reaching his RDA.

Perhaps the zoo would be a good place for the average man too. Too bad for mr. Average that the world isn’t exactly a zoo (at least not in a way we know). Mr. Average has to work his ribs out to earn his RDA of bamboo, and next to that he has to meet all kinds of social requirements within other kinds of legal boundaries while at it. It’s a tough life for mr. Average.

More often than a panda bear escapes from the zoo a mr. Average runs amok. He tries to rise above (or below) average, not knowing he is trapped in a catch 22 (not unlike the escaped panda bear that cannot find it’s favorite bamboo anywhere in the western world, and therefore has to return to the zoo in order to survive). The attempt of mr. Average to rise above average will be an average attempt, and thus mr. Average will still be seen as average.

This ill fate of the average man is whats keeping Juha Laatikainen and Konsta Ojala (both quite average themselves) off the streets of Helsinki since they met at Art School and started their collaboration. Their collaboration leads mostly to installations, drawings and animations. For Dolores they created a series of videos, which will be presented in an installation. They both hold a masters degree, but hey – that’s hardly above average these days.

Konsta Ojala (Finland 1979) lives and works in Berlin or Helsinki depending on his financial situation. He’s is the founder of Adios magazine which is a self-published art magazine. At the moment Ojala is working on the Adios III book. His work can be seen right now in Taidehalli (KunstHall), Helsinki and at the Teheran international poster biennale. More works on www.meandkonsta.com.

Juha Laatikainen (Finland 1978) works and lives in Utrecht. Laatikainen has recently been developing a peculiar approach to indulge himself in the life of people from a forgotten northern minority – the Sámi – in order to finish a project of video making about local identity. His work can be seen next in Bergen Norway.

Dolores curator: Joris Lindhout

Exhibition: 16/01/10 – 20/02/10

Ellen de Bruijne PROJECTS | Dolores
Rozengracht 207A
1016 LZ Amsterdam
The Netherlands