No Man is an Island

No Man is an Island

The work examines the relationship between two juxtaposed characters. An older man is seen dancing wildly in a courtyard. In front of him, a younger man sits on a bench, sobbing. The relationship between them is ambiguous. The older man's dance is clearly intended for the younger man, but the reasons behind it remain unknown. While a first assumption might be that they are lovers, as the film continues, the relationship appears to be more platonic, perhaps that of a father and son, or of a mentor and his apprentice. Just's strength is in the way he leaves it up to the spectator to decide on the backstory of the characters he presents. By eliminating verbal communication and using sound and hand gestures, the spectator must empathize with the characters in order to understand them.
Screening Schedule

No physical screenings scheduled.

Direction: Jesper Just
Script: Jesper Just
Cinematography: Jesper Just, Ulrik Weck
Actors: Niels Weyde, Johannes Lilleøre
Format: HD
Color: Color
Production Country: Denmark
Production Year: 2002
Duration: 4'
Contact: Perrotin Gallery France

Jesper Just

Jesper Just is a Danish artist who lives and works in New York. From 1997 to 2003, he studied at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts. His work has been presented in several solo exhibitions, in venues such as the Galerie Perrotin in Tokyo, Japan (2021) the Galerie Perrotin in New York, USA (2020), the MAAT in Lisbon, Portugal (2019), and the Palais de Tokyo in Paris, France (2015), whereas he has work in museums including the Guggenheim Museum in New York, Tate Modern in London, and the Museum of Modern Art in New York. In 2013, Jesper Just represented Denmark at the 55th Venice Biennale. Jesper Just uses the language of cinema to confront and divert the stereotypical Hollywood constructs of masculinity and femininity, as well as the biased representation of minorities and people with disabilities in mainstream culture. His short films and multi-projection video installations question the mechanisms of cinematic identification and break viewers’ expectations of narrative closure by unfolding surrealist, emotionally ambiguous, open-ended, and often silent situations or encounters. Interested in how public and private spaces define and shape human interactions, Just further plays with the notion of architecture as a performer, to echo and expand his characters’ enigmatic journeys.

Filmography

2002 No Man Is an Island (short)
2003 This Love is Silent (short)
2004 Bliss and Heaven (short)
2005 Something to Love (short)
2006 It Will All End In Tears (short)
2007 A Vicious Undertow (short)
2007 Some Draughty Window (short)
2008 A Voyage in Dwelling (short)
2010 Sirens of Chrome (short)
2011 This Nameless Spectacle (short)
2015 Servitudes Film #7 (short)
2017 Continuous Monuments (short)
2018 Circuits (Interpassivities) (short)
2023 Interfears (short)