Thomas Taube

Thomas Taube is a video artist. In his work however, he releases the medium from its linear and rigid narrative structure. Taube instead works with conventional cinematographic codes by using multiple approaches such as associative, reflective and surreal sequences. He abolishes the immediacy of the medium by means of its various elements and discontinuous montage. Well-known subjects (the night), like abstract structures (the narrative) are illustrated on the one hand, yet on the other, they differentiate the ways of seeing, observing, experiencing and reflecting.

In »Dark Matters« (2015), Taube approaches the remote state of a distant night, by investigating and collecting various evening experiences and their atmospheric perspectives. He conducted a series of interviews with night watchmen from around the world who shared their observations and personal experiences. It resulted in a series of stories about the night as a state, a shelter, a danger zone and a place of darkness. Taube succeeds in distilling the individual responses and feelings and translates them into simple and strange pictures played by a single protagonist. The character developed from this hybrid personality is one that cannot be fully grasped. The sense of darkness and loneliness places everything under the spell of self-observation and elevation.
The film plays the aftermath that lies beyond the conventional or mystical encounters that one may experience in the shadow world. The night becomes the state of the figure; the darkness has penetrated their existence and now both have formed the nature of the isolated protagonist.

In »Narration« (2016), Taube devotes himself to the various aspects and qualities of narration. It is an intimate linguistic form of communication that carries cultural traditions, histories, developments and changes. Six interrelated elements are combined to create »Narration«, those being: Setting, Situation, Narrator, Approach, Past and Construct. Taube presents narrative structures literally, figuratively and atmospherically. They are situated in remotes places and discuss social, political, every day and emotional topics. In order to execute these themes visually, the emotions and sensations are revisited and reflected upon by the characters.
In order to be able to experience simultaneity and entanglement, Taube presents his work through six parallel channels. He illustrates the notions of narration through image montage and through a series of continual images that project sensory experiences accompanied by auditory and visual codes. That said, the one-lane variant in a linear conception has the ability to intensify the integration of the many individual aspects and at the same time can show us that narrative, as the basic notion of our time will never cease to exist.