Hanneline Røgeberg
Double Blind by Hanneline Røgeberg
Double Blind by Hanneline Røgeberg presents double-handed pen and ink drawings and monotypes made from a set of surveillance stills. This project, started in the spring of 2021, drew inspiration from the methodology in Stein Bråten’s studies of mirroring and repetition in infant-caretaker relations in his book Roots and Collapse of Empathy, where a later added chapter also considers acts of improbable valor and inhuman cruelty in adulthood, including the Norwegian terrorist acts of July 22, 2011. The source stills are of undramatic moments from multiple sites where historic and contemporary events have taken place, such as Occupy Wall Street and the Government District in Oslo, and from 2019 in Christchurch, NZ, El Paso, Texas, and Bærum, Norway, where copycat terrorists recognized themselves in the signals left eight years earlier by the Norwegian gunman. Røgeberg’s blind contour drawings record these sites, but also consider what else is reflected back in them. Of particular interest is Martine Syms’ examination of the AI and facial recognition technologies behind the surveillance camera’s lens, and its starkly predetermined choices regarding who and what is seen, and what remains invisible. As both hands draw source-specific, blind contour lines, the resulting distortions make the drawings appear equally as seismic, graph-like records. They also reflect Røgeberg’s dominant left hand, visible as off-centered symmetry when presented in book format. Double Blind will feature a 2,000-word essay by Faye Hirsch and a short prose essay by the artist, and will be published by Space Sisters Press in Spring 2023.
