ADAM SAKS | DRY YOUR EYES

braskart

Galleri Christoffer Egelund is very proud to present Adam Saks’ first solo exhibition in the gallery with the title Dry Your Eyes. The artist works with different aspects of the depth and psyche of humanity and is fond of using different image elements from high and low culture, magazines, computer drawings and old tattoo motifs. In this exhibition Adam Saks presents new paintings and watercololurs, using the human body as basis for an extended narrative.

In the exhibition Dry Your Eyes you will meet monumental human bodies where the skin with its superimposed signs and tattoos bears witness to vanity, hierarchies and aggression. Fragments of rockscapes and building structures reach across the bodies, creating a kaleidoscopic space that alternates between the tattoo signs, violent natural settings and predators wriggling and turning their way out of rock formations, threatening to break through the canvas. Adam Saks´ pictorial technique alternates between the expressive and cool calculation, sampling motifs from a distant past with such themes as loyalty, love and brutality. It is in this collage-inspired crossover field Saks creates a relevant and contemporary universe.

The title of the exhibition, Dry Your Eyes, refers to a situation with a new beginning – a kind of catharsis or purification process where the signs on the marked bodies bear witness to their past or personal history. In connection with the exhibition a catalogue with a text by art historian Tine Nygaard will be published.

Adam Saks (born 1974) graduated from the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts (1993-99) and from Hochschule der Künste (HdK, 1996/97) in Berlin. Concurrently with Dry Your Eyes, Saks will present the solo exhibition Visual Voodoo at AROS Aarhus Kunstmuseum (23 April – 1 August 2010). Adam Saks normally lives and works in Berlin and has exhibited extensively both in Denmark and abroad. He has had solo exhibitions at, for instance, Nordiska Akvarellmuseet in Sweden, Lieu d´art Contemporain in France and South Jutland’s Art Museum, and has also been invited to join the Vilnius Painting Triennial in 2010 at the Contemporary Art Centre in Lithuania. Adam Saks is represented in the collections of Denmark’s National Gallery, KUNSTEN – Museum of Modern Art Aalborg, Nordiska Akvarellmuseet, South Jutland’s Art Museum, Malmö Art Museum and others and received the prestigious Niels Wessel Bagge’s honorary scholarship in 2009. In addition, Saks& rsquo; books Sealevel, Kleinheinrich Verlag, with text by Kay Heymer (director of Düsseldorf Kunstmuseum), and Elephant Island, Kerber Verlag, were published in 2009.

Galleri Christoffer Egelund

THOMAS PALME (DE) | LOST OR DAMNED!

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Galleri Christoffer Egelund is proud to present the German artist Thomas Palme’s first big solo exhibition in Denmark, Lost or Damned! In this exhibition Palme will present a series of new black/white pencil drawings and a small installation. The title of the exhibition, Lost or Damned!, refers directly to Søren Kierkegaard’s famous book whose Danish title is Enten – Eller (Either – Or), and points towards the artist’s existence. Like everybody else, he has to find his own way in life. Visitors to the exhibition will be presented with, amongst others, portraits of artists and philosophers with animals’ heads, for instance Gérard de Nerval, Vincent van Gogh and Arthur Schopenhauer. Most of these were hesitant in their approach to life and had a good deal of experience with anxiety, trembling and quivering. As Palme himself describes it: “Most of them only had to decide between: to be Lost or Damned”. The animals’ heads refer to the persons’ real character and the eternal connection between artist and nature and life’s merciless circle from birth to death. Through quotes in the works it becomes clear that Palme moves between and combines elements from the metaphysical, historical, scientific, religious and philosophical spheres. This crossing is not just a quest for answers to existential questions, but also an opening to change where new opportunities emerge.

The black/white pencil drawings which make up the majority of Palme’s practice are created with both the right and the left hand at the same time, creating an altogether unique energy and dynamism which in a compelling way unfolds in the area of tension between fine portraits and chaotic abstraction. There is a multitude of forces and energies at work and mutually at odds in Palme’s works. There is always a fight going on between what we can understand or identify as part of our history and what is shrouded in mysticism.

Thomas Palme (b. 1967) was educated at Vienna, Munich and Düsseldorf. He has received, amongst others, the ‘New Talent’ award at Art Cologne in 2006, and most recently he received a scholarship from Kunsthalle Krems in Austria, where he will also have a solo exhibition in 2010. Most recently, Thomas Palme has exhibited at the Museum of Art in Nocciano, Italy, Landesmuseum für Kunst und Kulturgeschichte, Schleswig-Holstein, Overbeck-Gesellschaft in Lübeck, Kunsthall Moosalpe, and he is represented at such collections as Pinakothek der Moderne’s permanent art collection in Munich.

Galleri Christoffer Egelund

Categorization

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Galleri Christoffer Egelund is proud to present the group exhibition Categorization where four Danish artists are presented: Dorte Jelstrup, Erik Øckenholt, Lars Bent Petersen and Ursula Andkjær Olsen. With their unique individual style, they each contribute to a varied and thought-provoking exhibition. Hence, visitors can experience everything from montage and drawing to painting, sculpture and poetry.

The exhibition Categorization focuses on these years’ enhanced trend of categorizing and segmenting everything and everybody. In this context, we could say that the four artists question especially the type of categorization that generalizes and trivializes our concept of human beings and life – something that an increasingly simplified news stream holds a substantial responsibility for. Thus many of the works engage in different kinds of representation criticism. In other words, the goal of the exhibition is not to contribute towards increased categorization, but on the contrary to question the kind of outlook that stems from this simplified trend towards categorization. Via the exhibition, the visitor is confronted with new and unexpected questions which challenge the spectator to take a more reflexive approach to our existence in the world, and hence to a potentially more sensitive approach to human life.

Dorte Jelstrup (b. 1964) has exhibited widely inside and outside Denmark and is represented in, for instance, the collections of the National Gallery of Denmark, the Museum of Southern Jutland and the National Gallery in Prague (Czechia). Erik Øckenholt (b. 1961) graduated from the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts (1982-88) and subsequently the School of Visual Arts and Art Presentation (1989-91). He is represented in, for instance, the National Gallery of Denmark and Vejle Museum of Art. Lars Bent Petersen (b. 1964), who graduated from the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts (1985-92), attracted attention with the solo exhibition Dreams, Lies and Other Works that was awarded a prize by the Danish Arts Foundation, at Overgaden – Institute of Contemporary Art. Moreover, he is represented in the Kastrupgaard Collection and at Esbjerg Museum of Art. Ursula Andkjær Olsen (b. 1970) graduated from Copenhagen University as Master of Arts in Musicology and Philosophy and from the Authors’ School (1997-99). She has recently published Havet er en scene (The Sea is a Scene) (Gyldendal 2008), which was, amongst other things, nominated for the Nordic Council Literature Prize, and awarded a prize by the Danish Arts Foundation.

Galleri Christoffer Egelund

JES WIND ANDERSEN

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JES WIND ANDERSEN
ART IS EASY

Galleri Christoffer Egelund is proud to present Jes Wind Andersen’s great individual exhibition Art Is Easy. Here the visitor will be introduced to a fascinating total installation consisting of paintings, photos, video and light that engage in a direct dialogue with the gallery space.

Art Is Easy is an investigation into paintings and their potential, and Jes Wind Andersen therefore questions the actual perception of paintings. This results in reflections on paintings as objects, as installation and as symbol, and reflections on the materials, tactility, presentation and perception. In order to illustrate the paintings’ basic qualities, Jes Wind Andersen confronts them with photos, video and light. How do formal and abstract paintings function in relation to, for instance, the figuratively recognisable nature photography? These constellations produce an interesting and thought-provoking dynamism between the different media and expressions of the exhibition, which challenges the visitor to reflect on the direct meeting with art and the ensuing presence, absence, distance etc.

The title, Art Is Easy, can be seen as a symbol or logo for the exhibition. However, it also refers to the feeling that fills the artist when something simply succeeds, or for that matter the feeling that fills the spectator when watching really good art.

Jes Wind Andersen (b. 1965) graduated from the Royal Danish Academy of Art (1992-98) and subsequently completed the Academy’s post-graduate studies at the Theory and Mediation Department (1998-2000). Jes Wind Andersen has exhibited widely both in Denmark and abroad at, for instance, Randers Museum of Art, Vejle Museum of Art, Bornholm Museum of Art and Chongqing Art Museum in Beijing, China.

Galleri Christoffer Egelund