ART WASH IN COPENHAGEN'S ART WORLD - NORMAL NORMAL 2013

DJ HVAD is the President of Nydanske Bank and Kommunal Dubplate Service in Copenhagen, Denmark.
He was recently contacted by the promoters of Chart Air Fair to play his lovely tunes in connection to their opening event on August 30th 2013. He was never told that Danske Bank was the sponsor who was paying for his fee, but just that it was going to be at Charlottenborg by the Art Academy and Kongens Nytorv.

If you have followed this blog and the adventures at Roskilde Festival 2013, you might have seen that one of the main issues we confronted Roskilde Festival with was: "How can you be in partnership with Danske Bank when it goes against everything the Festival is about?"

The above article by Skift Bank's Peter Ahrenfeldt Schrøder and Pil Berner Strandberg says: "Put the Money where the Heart is Roskilde"

To the far right in Red pants, Yana Sarna from Voina Art Group as part of The Triangle Project Panel Debate Performance at Roskilde Festival 2013. She and the the rest of the group left in protest against Roskilde Festival's choice of partnership with Danske Bank.

Voina's main message to the people at Roskilde Festival was "Fuck Hypocrisy"!  "Hypocrisy is the state of falsely claiming to possess positive characteristics, such as religiosity or virtues, that one lacks. Hypocrisy involves the deception of others and is thus a kind of lie".

On the very same stage, DJ HVAD together with Yaa Lioness performed a wonderful musical story with live mix, song, dance and interaction with the audience at The Velvet State.

When DJ HVAD saw that his name was on the same poster as Danske Bank, he reacted fast and with one of his crew members hacked Danske Banks logo and mashed up the E - invite for the event poster of Chart Air Fair.

They of course also made some smaller changes here and there, including sampling the logo of Skift Bank, adding Syg Nok Records Logo and such, as if the poster was a mixed tune to be turned into a dubplate vinyl and played on a Technics 1210, Very Loud. It is nice to also see how they put DJ HVAD's name in front of the band "Synd og Skam", that in Danish means "Sin and Shame".

SIN: Sin has been defined as "to miss the mark"
SHAME: Shame is, variously, an affect, emotion, cognition, state, or condition. The roots of the word shame are thought to derive from an older word meaning "to Cover"; as such, covering oneself, literally or figuratively, is a natural expression of shame.

Well, since DJ HVAD has a huge following that are very much aware of the Sin and Shame of being on the same poster as Danske Bank, they soon shared his remixed Tune on all kind of social media platforms in support. Since Copenhagen is a very small city, this Tune was soon heard by some of the gallerists that landed the Danske Bank sponsorship, to pay for their new brilliant project. The gallerists contacted the young man from Jylland who had booked DJ HVAD and told him he must make sure to force DJ HVAD to censor his Tune. They were afraid to loose their sponsorship and DJ HVAD was actually told that his Tune could make this happen. He was also told that if he did not remove the Tune from his and his friends social media platforms, he was fired from playing at their party. The wording was more or less: "We see no other option than to cancel your performance, unless you remove your poster from the internet"

When DJ HVAD said that he did not want to remove anything from anywhere and that this was all crazy talk, he was told that he started to sound like a Terrorist. He was also told that he had 24 hours to give them an answer if he was going to remove the Tune, or he was out. So, another collaborator of DJ HVAD sent a message to two Danish Newspapers, that said he was being "censored by Charter Art Fair and Danske Bank for hacking their poster and logo, and by the way was also called a Terrorist". Soon thereafter, he got a call from the young man from Jylland saying all was good and he should just come and play and have a lovely time doing so. As a matter of fact, DJ HVAD was paid 1000 kr more than they had first agreed upon.

Feeling that this circus had to be seen live, Yrs Trly went to go see the amazing exhibition with the best and most expensive artists in the northern hemisphere. One was met by a huge crowd of a mix of young hipsters, artists, the art world, art wanna-bees, advertising phonies and desperate bankers. The lovely outdoor open spaces within the Art Academy and Charlottenborg Contemporary Art Center, was crammed wall to wall with sponsors and various Danske Bank booths and VIP areas. The stage whereupon the bands played was so small, I thought it was a Danske Bank Cat Walk for Foxy Money Rats. The beer sponsor had green umbrellas hung over the crowd to Cover them from the skies.

I pushed myself through the mad crowds of sheep, to as fast as possible get to the entrance of Charlottenborg to see the Holy Art, that I had come there to see. However, the above Guard in a black suit and red tie told me that this was not possible. He told me that I was too late and that what was currently going on upstairs in the exhibition space, was a VIP dinner and event for Danske Bank.

I was of course very dissapointed not to experience the art, but was told that I could come back the next day. I went over to the poster that was placed next to the entrance, where I could read that I would need to pay 100 kr to get in to see the art, that was hung on the walls of Charlottenborg and sponsored by Danske Bank. Also notice in the above image, that a sticker with how much one must pay to get in has been placed over the original print on th poster. Did it first say "For Free", but they could see they could make an extra buck in the door?

The next day I went to brunch and picked up the newspaper, where I could read that without Danske Bank, Chart Air Fair would never have taken place at all. I tried to understand what the gallerists that had arranged Chart Air Fair was thinking by letting themselves be sold out to Danske Bank, even if they of course knew how wrong it was. Was it their own artistic statement of collaborating with Danske Bank as a way to comment on the Bank World and how wrong it would be to actually do this, by doing it? Essentially, all they needed to do was to let Danske Bank feel that they were treated like VIP's and being connected in some way with the Art World, having a staff party in one of the most exclusive locations in Copenhagen, being surrounded by some of the most exclusive art in the world. Creating a situation for the people from Danske Bank to feel good about themselves, to let them celebrate their amazing theft of the Danish People's tax money, the outragous bonuses to their leaders and of being even more VIP than they Art World Crowd, that will do any kind of song and dance for money. If so, it is even more brilliant than I could imagine. If not...it is a Sin and Shame.

The very fact that that no Danish media even has been somewhat questioning and critical of this situation is yet another case of a classic mass delusion, that my homeboy HC Andersen wrote about in "The Emperors New Clothes". Everybody knows it is wrong, but they have too much to loose by saying anything about it. DJ HVAD says HVAD! and continues his mission with Cosmic Normal without Standards.



HVAD