2007/2017 | 3-channel video projection

«For the video work Personal Army, Feldmeier has separated people wearing camouflage in a civilian context and as fashion accessories from their original context of her stock of images and recruited them into an ‹army› of her own, through which she herself marches as a dwarf slowly growing into a grotesque dictator.» (Eva Scharrer) 

«For three years Sonja Feldmeier filmed people wearing military dress in many countries. She calls her procedure an ‹act of recruitment› which turns the people into members of her personal army. After the montage of images, they become protagonists of a video work in which this personal army marches chaotically through unknown cities. In these scenarios, the figure of a dwarf intervenes, transforming into a giant over time. The figure tries to create order in the thick of the crowd - a thankless, almost hopeless task.» (Giovanni Carmine)

«The fact that an artist presents herself in the dress of a pantomime general strikes us at first as strange enough. In fact, however, the motif is anything but arbitrarily chosen: Recruiting soldiers is an apt metaphor for the act of artistic appropriation. Seen in this light, the narrative context of Personal Army addresses nothing other than Sonja Feldmeier's own strategy. In conversations, the artist repeatedly emphasizes the importance of the artistic recontextualization of her documentary video sequences: Sonja Feldmeier works with carefully and elaborately produced narrative frameworks. If we interpret the motif of recruitment in Personal Armyas a fundamental statement on her own working method, then we can not only observe Sonja Feldmeier alimenting herself with found visual material, but watch her make art out of everyday life.» (Claudia Spinelli