Like Father, Like Son, Like Michael Douglas: Axel Petersén

Like Father, Like Son, Like Michael Douglas is a video installation by Axel Petersén. This is his first solo exhibition at Gallery Niklas Belenius.

In Paul Verhoevens erotic thriller Basic Instinct from 1992, Michael Douglas’s character is put to the test. Is he still living up to the image of his own sexuality? Is he still the sex symbol Michael Douglas, son to the former sex symbol Kirk Douglas?

In Like Father, Like Son, Like Michael Douglas Axel Petersén is staging a sexual generation shift. Through a number of scenes he instructs his father, Etienne Petersén to play the main male character while he himself portrays the female counterparts – a father and a son together watching and acting Basic Instinct.

Axel Petersén, born in Stockholm 1979, is a visual artist and filmmaker. He has made numerous short films and video installations that have been shown widely in art and film contexts. His first feature film AVALON, won the Fipresci award for best debut 2011. He has a MFA from The Royal Institute of Art, Stockholm; he also studied film at FAMU, Academy of Performing Arts in Prague and most recently attended the Mountain School of Arts in Los Angeles while he wrote the final act for his upcoming feature Under the Pyramid.