'Individuality is a monster' was planned as a kind of trailer for an imaginary computer game. A young man and a young woman speak to the public in turn. Both are cast as stereotypes. The somewhat glum, androgynous young man lies on a sofa rattling off clichÈs like 'big men protect big things'. The independent looking young woman speaks emotional, 'personal' texts, which ultimately seem to be just as clichÈd. Together they introduce a little box with a key and the phrase 'enter the text' flashes repeatedly on the screen. This suggests that the viewer can participate in the game, but there is nothing interactive about this work - intentionally. In actual fact, it is about a complicated role game jam-packed with gender clichÈs. The surprise with this video is not so much the fact that both personages are played by one and the same person. The real confusion is caused by the soundtrack. The voices are, it is true, gender-specific - the man talks with a male voice and the woman with a female voice - but they are not the speakers' voices. There are also even different female and male voices that disembody, as it were, the personages and this reinforces even more strongly the element of androgyny. The viewer, more or less subconsciously inclined to identify with one of the personages and their manner of speaking, is sent off on the wrong track in every possible way, which of course starts off a process of consciousness-raising. This could have an element of dogmatism to it, but luckily it is done quite intelligently.
Astrid Klein uses more or less the same techniques in all her videos. She uses fragments of dialogues and other sound material from feature films and television programmes and mixes these with her own sound recordings, creating a new soundtrack. The images are then adapted live to the sound, which turns round the usual synchronization technique. She is always the only actor in one or more roles. Her work capitalizes on the memory of the seasoned film and television viewer who slumps down in front of the box every evening and identifies with what she/he sees.
– Marianne Brouwer
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