Oslo, Norway, the second in Holten’s Ragnarok trilogy that began with the widely acclaimed The Readymades, cleverly gathers romance, cartography and Nordic myth in a meta-fictional retelling or interpretation of the streets of the eponymous capital. A self-aware tale of love and the fictions that are told in the process of it, the novel will be enjoyed by readers of Bolaño, Cortázar and Calvino and should be attempted by others... Continue reading here.
Monday, 21 December 2015
Review of Oslo, Norway in Structo
Sunday, 20 December 2015
Wednesday, 18 November 2015
Sans Serriffe, Amsterdam
16.11.2015 John Holten reads from OSLO, NORWAY
13:00—14:00
John Holten published his first novel The Readymades in 2011 (with artwork by Darko Dragicevic). The art group he created in the novel, The LGB Group, enjoyed exhibitions in many cities as well as being included in The Armory Show, New York in 2012.
Oslo, Norway is his second novel and is an intriguing story of love and loss that begins in the affluent and rapidly growing city of Oslo, Norway. It follows the story of William Day, an economic migrant who moves to the city to work as a mechanical engineer before chance thrusts him into the alluring world of Sybille and her artist friend Camille. As they do their best to reconcile growing differences in personality and culture, Camille’s growing influence over Sybille threatens the relationship, before her dangerous friends in the Oslo underworld finally undo William’s search for stability. This sets William – and the reader – in the direction of the novel’s horizon, which is set outside of historical time and space, taking in the history of oil exploration, Norse mythology, coronal mass ejections and post-apocalyptic landscapes.
As well as working as an editor, John Holten has written collaborative texts for a number of artists and his writing has appeared in numerous publications. His work has appeared in many international contemporary art settings such as Malmö konsthall, The White Building London, David Zwirner Gallery New York (with Aengus Woods), NGBK and Agora, Berlin and Villa Romana, Florence amongst others. His video commercials for Oslo, Norway have been exhibited in Plan B Gallery and Team Titanic, Berlin, Extrapool, Nijmegen and Thyssen-Bornemisza Art Contemporary, Vienna.
Tuesday, 18 August 2015
Wednesday, 15 April 2015
Exhibition and Book Launch: Oslo, Norway
Oslo, Norway: Exhibition and Book Launch
In November 2011 Darko Dragičević and John Holten carried out ‘It’ s Already A Success!’, a weeklong reading of the entire novel The Readymades as part of an exhibition by The LGB Group at the legendary Gallery D.O.R. in Brussels. For the first international release of his follow up novel, Oslo, Norway, Holten will once more read a novel in full. Echoing not only the earlier performance, but also contemporary writer Travis Jeppeson, who has read his novel The Suiciders in full at various venues, the performance posits a total exposure of the literary work, allowing the audience to come and go, converse and drink a glass of wine over a period of several hours for durations of their choosing. This is not so much a comment on the contested audience expectation for free content, but an investigation into new modes of attention and readership, how one can go about performing a novel, as well as subverting the social expectations of a traditional book launch.
Alongside the reading will be a screening of ‘Blips’, a series of pseudo commercials Holten produced and screened over the last two years. These have been screened individually in Thyssen-Bornemisza Art Contemporary, Vienna, (Blip # 4); Extrapool, Nijmegan (Blip#3); Team Titanic, Berlin (Blip # 2) and Galerie Plan B, Berlin (Blip# 1). These will be slowed down to approach the length of the reading, a mixture of footage from Oslo and extracts from the novel, they counteract and draw out what the audience may or may not hear depending on the length they listen.
Oslo, Norway takes the form of a literary atlas, telling its stories over 39 sections titled after streets and places around Oslo and its environs. These are included at the beginning of each of the three sections of the book and the original drawings will also be on display, along with other totem like iterations of the book. In line with Holten’s practice, all aspects of the book and its creation are presented over the course of the performance and exhibition heralding, as does the form of the novel, a new mode of reading, one that is inherently based on life online and how the majority of textual matter is now read, bringing that into an offline, durational and haptic literary experience.
John Holten is a writer and artist as well as a publisher. Born in 1984 in Ireland, he studied at University College Dublin and the Sorbonne-Paris IV before obtaining an MPhil from Trinity College Dublin. In 2011 he published his first novel The Readymades to great acclaim, and the art group he created in the novel (with Darko Dragičević), The LGB Group, enjoyed exhibitions in many cities as well as being included in The Armory Show, New York in 2012. Known for his collaborative projects, Holten has written for many artists such as Natalie Czech, Mahony, Darri Lorenzen and Jani Ruscica, often working closely with them to produce immersive or participatory texts. His work has appeared in many international contemporary art settings such as Malmö konsthall, The White Building London, David Zwirner Gallery New York (with Aengus Woods), NGBK and Agora, Berlin and Villa Romana, Florence amongst others. Having co-founded Broken Dimanche Press as an international art press in 2009, he has overseen as Editor-In-Chief more than thirty publications and attendant exhibitions, projects and public events. In 2012 he travelled to the Congo with artist Richard Mosse for whom he edited A Supplement to The Enclave as part of Mosse’s 2014 Deutsche Börse Photography Prize winning exhibition in London. In 2011 he received a Literature Bursary from the Arts Council of Ireland.
Alongside the reading will be a screening of ‘Blips’, a series of pseudo commercials Holten produced and screened over the last two years. These have been screened individually in Thyssen-Bornemisza Art Contemporary, Vienna, (Blip # 4); Extrapool, Nijmegan (Blip#3); Team Titanic, Berlin (Blip # 2) and Galerie Plan B, Berlin (Blip# 1). These will be slowed down to approach the length of the reading, a mixture of footage from Oslo and extracts from the novel, they counteract and draw out what the audience may or may not hear depending on the length they listen.
Oslo, Norway takes the form of a literary atlas, telling its stories over 39 sections titled after streets and places around Oslo and its environs. These are included at the beginning of each of the three sections of the book and the original drawings will also be on display, along with other totem like iterations of the book. In line with Holten’s practice, all aspects of the book and its creation are presented over the course of the performance and exhibition heralding, as does the form of the novel, a new mode of reading, one that is inherently based on life online and how the majority of textual matter is now read, bringing that into an offline, durational and haptic literary experience.
John Holten is a writer and artist as well as a publisher. Born in 1984 in Ireland, he studied at University College Dublin and the Sorbonne-Paris IV before obtaining an MPhil from Trinity College Dublin. In 2011 he published his first novel The Readymades to great acclaim, and the art group he created in the novel (with Darko Dragičević), The LGB Group, enjoyed exhibitions in many cities as well as being included in The Armory Show, New York in 2012. Known for his collaborative projects, Holten has written for many artists such as Natalie Czech, Mahony, Darri Lorenzen and Jani Ruscica, often working closely with them to produce immersive or participatory texts. His work has appeared in many international contemporary art settings such as Malmö konsthall, The White Building London, David Zwirner Gallery New York (with Aengus Woods), NGBK and Agora, Berlin and Villa Romana, Florence amongst others. Having co-founded Broken Dimanche Press as an international art press in 2009, he has overseen as Editor-In-Chief more than thirty publications and attendant exhibitions, projects and public events. In 2012 he travelled to the Congo with artist Richard Mosse for whom he edited A Supplement to The Enclave as part of Mosse’s 2014 Deutsche Börse Photography Prize winning exhibition in London. In 2011 he received a Literature Bursary from the Arts Council of Ireland.
Monday, 30 March 2015
Oslo, Norway
It's been a while in the making, but finally my next book 'Oslo, Norway' is due for release next month. In celebratory anticipation and to help cover the costs toward remaining production processes, BDP are offering 100 signed copies for pre-sale over the next three weeks, with free shipping. It's a curious little book, three years of toil and inspiration have been condensed into its merry words and obtuse declarations and now I'm really looking forward to it finding a reading audience. Your support means everything.
/This is not a crowd funding campaign/
Please email me for a Media Kit/Review copy
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