MENNO ADEN | Panel Flats

Filmstill from "Panel Flats", 2008
PAL, Color, Sound, 1:30 Min (Loop)

Panel Flats (2004)

Der immer gleiche Bildausschnitt unterschiedlicher Plattenbaufassaden lenkt den Blick auf jeweils neun von Betonsegmenten eingefasste dreiteilige Fensterrahmen. Moderne Tryptychen, die in ihrer gleichsam individuellen wie gleichförmigen Gestaltung begrenzte Einblicke auf die Lebenssituationen hinter der Fasssade gewähren.

Panel Flats (Video), 2008
For his video "Panel Flats" German Artist Menno Aden shows more than 100 different windows of panel flats one after another in a fast exchange. This technique allows us to compare individually created spaces inside the same frame. The windows become interfaces that communicate from inside to outside as they reflect the way of life of the inhabitants. At the same time they can literally reflect the world outside. In this way our curiosity for other peoples' lives receives a voyeuristic aftertaste.

Through the almost similar repetitive pictures and sounds the looped film loses its humanity more and more. With no beginning and no end the concrete landscape seems to be end- and changeless and the video reminds us of our own "prefabricated" design for life.