b. 1965 in Norway
Lene Berg currently lives and works in New York City. She was trained as a filmmaker at Dramatiska Institutet in Stockholm and combines her filmmaking skills with installation, photography and text based work to explore the role of art in war. She often draws inspiration from documentary material and in recent years has been developing projects in public spaces. In her solo show at Midway Contemporary Art, in Minneapolis (2007), her video The Man in the Background and her publication, Gentlemen and Arseholes, were launched as two parts of one project about art and propaganda during the Cold War. The project focused on the cultural journal ‘Encounter’ that had been founded and distributed in 1953 as one of the undertakings of the Congress of Cultural Freedom (1957-1967). Berg’s approach called into question what was defined as a ‘liberal conspiracy’ and what was otherwise deemed a successful state sponsored cultural effort carried out by a powerful intelligence agency. Amongst other exhibitions, Berg has participated in ‘Transmediale’ 08, Berlin; ‘Pensee Sauvage’,
Frankfurter Kunstverein, 2007; and ‘Headlines and Footnotes’, Henie Onstad Kunstsenter, Norway, 2008.