Johanna Billing

Sweden, b. 1973 in Jönköping, lives and works in Stockholm.

Konstfack, Dept. for Art.

First sound art work: Musik för mig/kanske för dig, 1996

I work mainly with video, film and music. Together with my brother I have since 1997 run Make It happen, a Stockholm based record label that works with unestablished groups and artists working with music.

In my films I often involve music and performance – which can become a medium of exchange, memory and reconstruction. Magical World (2005) is a work made with a group of children at a cultural centre outside Zagreb, Croatia, who practice a song of transformation written by Sidney Barnes in America in the 60s. The ongoing touring film and live music project You don’t love me yet (2002-2006) is a project based on the song written by American song-writer Roky Erickson (1984), playing with how covers invite you to subversion and reclaiming. The tour included live interpretations by local participants at each venue. This project played with the potential of covers and their invitation for subversion and reclamation.

Collaborations with, e.g. Kitsune, Åbäke, Happy Pappy, WHW (What How and for Whom, Zagreb), Blood Music, If I can’t dance I don’t want to be part of your revolution, Copenhagen free university, saralunden, On hospitality, A Fia Backström production, Vita Kuben, Norrlandsoperan, Taking the matter into common hands, Enthusiasm: (Films of Love, Labour and Longing, Cummings and Lewandowska), The Complaints Choir, Radiodays, Creative Commons, H.A.R.T.A, & Raluca Voinea, Romania, Essen, Signal, Karl Holmqvist, Living and Loving, and Burning TV.

Links:

www.makeithappen.org

www.myspace.com/recordlabelmakeithappen

http://www.makeithappen.org/johannabilling.html

http://www.makeithappen.org/ydlmy2.html