About Control
“...And a voice that told her when and where to act, She said I've lost control again.” She’s Lost Control - Joy Division (1979)
About Common Ground is an ongoing photographic investigation by Danish photographer Mads Holm, who has spent the last six years creating a complex visual treatise on the hard controls of advanced capitalism and the invisible power structures at play within the modern world. Holm has been slowly and carefully amassing a series of photographs which coalesce to draw our attention to the often invisible imposition of power structures into our everyday lives, both as individuals and as a society as a whole.
Holm’s photographic mode of enquiry weaves together distinctly different kinds of photographs and sequenced in such a way that his pictures communicate the tensions between what Holm himself describes as the ‘collective consciousness and the influence of advanced capitalism’. In works such as After Control and In Control; both made in 2015, we are presented with two seemingly disparate images that convey succinctly the very essence of the project. The latter image deftly demonstrates Holm’s understanding of anonymous public space as a form of theatre. This, coupled with his ability to render the ensuing drama within a single image, is one of his greatest strengths as a picture maker. One could be forgiven for mistaking this photograph as a tableau vivant, imbued with the same cinematic tensions found in early pictures by Jeff Wall or Gregory Crewdson, but without any of the associated artifice. Indeed throughout About Common Ground, we are confronted with photographs made in anonymous public spaces and sprawling urban landscapes which proves to be fertile ground for a photographer whose eye is trained on the soft power structures that dictate the way we lead our lives.
Holm’s ability to make these kinds of tableau photographs on the street is by no means happenstance. It is the result of years spent honing his skills as a photographer and understanding acutely the types of picture he is seeking to make. Having spent periods studying at Fatamorgana (Copenhagen), International Centre for Photography (New York) and latterly Glasgow School of Art Holm melds together influences from these distinct institutions, both in terms of conceptual approach and technical execution. At the very core of Holm’s practice is the belief in picture-making, combined with a very deliberate and relentless pursuit of the photographs he wishes to make. Holm is not passively waiting for events to unfold in front of his camera, instead, he is actively seeking them out as a means of taking direct action. Rather than merely recording the events around him as a passive bystander Holm is an active participant in many of the photographs he makes. The camera allows the photographer to take an objectively critical approach to the subjects he photographs. The photographs that make About Common Ground are not bound to the conventions of photojournalism or street photography, neither are they tied to the mode of documentary photography. Instead, through his diversity of approach Holm’s photographs exist at the intersection of these photographic traditions. This nascent form of picture making crystallises the primary concerns of Holm’s and grants him the freedom of expression to make a very contemporary record of our time. About Common Ground is ever-changing, ongoing and amorphous in its execution. Through this assimilation of images, the viewer is confronted with an attack of photography that raises increasingly complex questions about the ways and means in which our everyday lives are controlled.
As with many artists, Holm uses his camera as a means to understand the world around him. A number of works explore the seemingly expressive yet tightly controlled tropes of cosplay and furry fandom, two subcultures that seem to espouse creativity and self-expression yet conform to a series of distinctly codified cliches. Holm’s photographs derive from a genuine interest in understanding these modes of alternative self-expression rather than exploiting them as a source of derision and ridicule. John Portman (2017), which depicts a young woman crossing the street dressed as Harley Quinn from the Batman franchise is reminiscent of the work of Philip Lorca diCorcia’s Streetwork series and portraits of LA street hustlers, sharing with them a sense of being visually monumental yet anonymous. Holm’s interest in these fringe subcultures suggests something of a wider narrative at play within About Common Ground - the ways in which we self-identify and in turn self-censor ourselves, another example of the soft control at play within the collective groupthink of advanced capitalism.
When looking the multifarious types of photographs that make up About Common Ground there is a persistent sense that Holm is navigating the fine line between control and chaos, such as the case in Test II (2017), where the visually absurd nature of the image belies the underpinning tension of its subject matter. However, this sinister feeling of impending chaos is addressed explicitly in a series of photographs made at Schnöggersburg, a state of the art urban warfare training facility in northern Germany. Holm spent many years thinking of Schnöggersburg, an artificial city being built near Altmark to train the German Armed Forces soldiers in contemporary urban warfare. Early presentations of the About Common Ground featured texts and information relating to the complex in lieu of access to photograph the site directly. It wasn’t until 2016 that Holm began photographing here, shortly after the first phase of building was completed. The fabricated city will comprise of over 16 km of road infrastructure, including a four-lane expressway and several bridges that span the artificial river EISER. Due for completion in 2020, the city incorporates every urban theatre of war imaginable, including an expansive network of sewage tunnels, high rise buildings, industrial units, suburban residential neighborhoods and religious buildings; including a mosque, synagogue, and church. The compound will span 6km2 and will contain over 500 buildings, easily the most advanced simulated city infrastructure in Europe. Holm’s surreal photographs of this tightly controlled artificial city form a secondary strand of photographs called Barrier Operation, an ongoing, parallel photographic investigation that exists within About Common Ground. The banal, grey dirge of concrete buildings that Holm photographs belie the sinister nature of their use. There is a deep-rooted pathos inherent within these studies. That such a costly structure can be built at a time when many of these same NATO countries are closing their borders to tens of thousands of refugees; fleeing exactly the kinds of conflict Schnöggersburg is used to train for, is a damning an indictment of the power structures at play throughout Holm’s photographs.
With each new exhibition, Holm adapts and amends the photographs in the sequence, drawing upon an ever-increasing body of work, his approach to exhibiting the work is as diverse as his approach to making the images. Through the deft juxtaposition of images; made over a number years and across numerous contrasting locations, it becomes clear that Holm is an internationalist in his outlook, both politically and artistically. His work demonstrates a democratic, all-encompassing approach to picture-making, melding intimate photographs with objective field studies and incidental encounters on the street. This non-hierarchical approach extends to the presentation of the work too, changing and evolving each time it is exhibited. This allows Holm to create new connections between the works on show whilst creating a new context for a body of work that is continually in flux. About Common Ground is a contemporary record of our time, through Holm’s images the tensions of modern life are writ large. Whilst his images do not offer any alternative answers, by illuminating upon the complex and often hidden power structures at play in our everyday lives Holm’s photographs offer us hope that change is possible, if only we care to seek it out.