puffed

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Edding 660 The feeling is a mix of smoothness and resistance as the eraser glides across the slick surface, picking up the ink—a strange combination of fluidity and friction. There’s an indistinct squeak, a whisper of sound that changes with pressure and with the dryness of the ink. A tactile ritual, a visual one too: bold lines and colors fading, leaving only a slick surface, the faintest traces remaining, as though the board itself hesitates to let go of what was. A reset.

 

The blackboard has appeared throughout art history, a place where ideas are temporarily inscribed, debated, and rewritten. It subverts its utilitarian role as a teaching tool, a bearer of wisdom and authority. Blackboards can be washed clean with a wet cloth, restoring them to a like-new appearance, whereas dry-erase boards are prone to developing fine scratches and dents on their surface over time—small imperfections to their glossy whiteness.

 

In her video works, Julie Koldby explores movement as a disruption in the system—dance as a catalyst for exhilaration and exhaustion. Here, they appear in the form of a music video for the song "Rest of My Life" by artist and musician Martin Hasfeldt, without sentimentality, blurring the lines between media. Training routines are unraveled and reassembled into an intuitive sequence. Floor marks become graphic scores, guiding the body through a shifting landscape of motion.

 

Entrancing spectacle takes us to a hypnotic state between controlled technique and raw physical depletion: freedom and collapse. Like sliding and not being able to control your body—gravity and momentum taking over. Shaking a snow globe, releasing a storm. The tiny bits swirl and tumble in a flurry of motion.

 

Mattresses absorb movement. Compressed, released, imprinted with the weight of gestures, the surface will, for a moment, remember past encounters. Exhilaration and exhaustion. The punches fade, but never all at once. A cycle of repetition: tension and release.

 

To-do lists: a way to make the chaos of thought manageable. The satisfaction of crossing off tasks, each checkmark or strike-through offering a fleeting moment of accomplishment. Progress, visible, tangible—a reminder of what you’ve already done. Are marks on a surface artistic gestures or records of the act of producing art? These works take on a palimpsestic quality through their making. Dry-erase boards are temporary paintings, constantly altered, constantly in flux, existing somewhere between drawing and writing. Until, at some point, they’re wiped clean.

 

Text by Jonathan Bue.

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Exhibition period: February 27 - March 8 2025

Building S, Copenhagen, Denmark.

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