Defense against the Unpredictable

Video installation on three - five Screens.

HD. English speak or subtitles.

Now when the Cold War era and the imagination of the enemy has collapsed, Defense against the unpredictable investigates the conception of the enemy that have replaced the old ones.

The threat the world today is facing with nuclear war, terrorist attacks and man-caused pollution and natural disasters are not the same as when the Cold War era fortifications were built. Here was an enemy clear and largely directed against the Soviet. Today, the terrorist attacks and man-made pollution and natural disaster increasingly taken over the lead as catalysts for Worst Case Scenario.

During the Cold War, one could analyze and understand the world from causality, and states and authorities had published and itemized plans for how you as an individual should behave in situations of war and crises. Now the enemy is more abstract, and where and when is unpredictable. As an individual you can question whether the state can even take care of the individual.

We meet some so-called "Preppers" who are preparing to various global disasters, where all the infrastructure and organization breaks down, where electricity, water supply and lack of food are being substantial. The predictions are many, ranging from disasters caused by ISIS, terrorism, nuclear attacks, virus outbreaks, natural disasters, economic collapse, EMP (electromagnetic pulse), volcanic eruptions in Yellow Stone, solar storm (solar storms) ect...

Preppers are representatives of the individual's ultimate distrust of the state and the need to take the situation into their own hands for fear of Worst Case Scenario..

Opposite people from the Defence Command Denmark and Danish emergency management agency are talking about conflict management at Worst Case Scenario. A disaster historian talks about the unpredictable unpredictable.

On the third screen in the installation we drive with a meditative camera-flow through long corridors at Stevnsfortet, a fortress from the Cold War period.

REVISIT Institute for Contemporary Art, Copenhagen 2019

Prepper with his survival kit backpack

Prepper creating sustainable aquaponic system

A Prepper shop

A fortress from the Cold War period.

Inclusion / Exclusion. ARoS Aarhus Art Museum, Denmark. 2014

Defense against the unpredictable

Cast

Hugh Simpson / Founder of XtremePreparedness.com

David Epstein /Bioponica

Robert and Roanne Grisworld  / Ready Made Recourses & Sunrise Holistic Solutions

Per Reppenhagen Grim / Danish Emergency Management Agency Nukleart

Rasmus Dahlberg / Historian

Aase Schioldan / former Major at Danish Airforce-Guideat Stevnsfortet

Steadycam

Anders Holck Petersen

Photographer

Natascha Thiara Rydvald

Hanne Nielsen & Birgit Johnsen 

Production coordinator

Karin Petersen

Edit

Hanne Nielsen & Birgit Johnsen

Soundscape and Sound edit

Søren Bendz

Jacob Ellerup

We also greatfully acknowledge

Duck And Cover / Bert The Turtle Civil Defense Film / Written by Raymond J. Mauer and directed by Anthony Rizzo of Archer Productions. 

FAMILY FALLOUT SHELTERS: Nuclear War for Housewives Vintage Film - 1960s American Civil Defense

We wish to thank

Huge Simpson, David Epstein, Robert and Roanne Grisworld ,Per Reppenhagen Grim, Rasmus Dahlberg, Åse Schioldan, Lars Erslev Andersen, Claes Christensen, Martin Jespersen

 A special thanks to:

Museum Chief Curator, historian Thomas Tram Pedersen at the Cold War Museum Stevnsfort

Produced with the support from

Statens Kunstfond  / Projektstøtteudvalget for Billedkunst

Aarhus Kulturudviklings pulje

 A video by

Hanne Nielsen and Birgit Johnsen 

@ 2014