Artists

Rasmus Røhling

Press release

The title of Rasmus Røhling’s exhibition, Open Label Placebos, refers to a medical term: the placebo effect describes the phenomenon of patients’ health showing improvement despite being treated with substances that are inactive or without curative effect for the given condition. In the case of open label placebos, the patients are informed upfront that they are given placebos; yet the treatment can still contribute to improving symptoms. Røhling offers this specific terminology and the paradoxes associated with it as preamble to a group of existing and newly produced works.

Ranging from video works and drawings to sculptural installations, the works deal in various ways with the healthcare system and in particular the interfaces between the medical sector and the general public. In contrast to the rigour and density of visual data circulated internally within the industry, the simplified visual language intended to convey this knowledge to the “outside” world often appears unintentionally ambiguous. In Røhling’s work, these ambivalences are juxtaposed with re-worked historical and contemporary examples of medical animations and devices, bodily fluids and hygiene products, among other things—ultimately to propose this care simulacrum as a symptom of and signifier for broader questions around visual communication and politics of representation.

The exhibition is supported by Danish Arts Foundation, Knud Højgaards Foundation, Grosserer L.F. Foundation, Danish Art Workshops, Art Hub Copenhagen, Kugledynehjælpen and Leuchtturm 1917.