"White: The North Stars Series: Contemporary Norwegian Art in NYC" Exhibition
NOoSPHERE
This event has ended.
.NO presents WHITE, the second chapter of THE NORTH STARS. A series of 3 month‐long group shows, each exhibit features contributions by 8 10 visual artists paired with one or more performance artist(s). Alluding to the participants' shared geographic origin, the title of the series is a tongue in cheek‐reference to Polaris – Norwegian artists are, of course, the guiding lights of the art world! But implicit in it is also the very fallacy of the notion of one leading direction in the arts: with more than one steering star, who knows where true north lies?
Structured around the colors of the Norwegian flag, the series explores the symbolism and psychological connotations inherent in each of these hues. Currently on view through March 3, the first installment is dedicated to the color BLUE. Then, opening on March 4, comes WHITE, a sampling of more pared‐down pictorial languages: minimalist investigations of form as well as figurative work where the expressive force resides in the naked line. RED, the final chapter of the series, will present narratives on the eternal themes of love, passion, gender, sex, pain, violence, and lust for life, all conveyed through a wide range of depictions of the body.
With an emphasis on the medium of drawing, WHITE will feature Continuous City, a multi‐piece in ink by Berlin‐based Björn Hegardt, internationally known for his innovative editorship of FUKT ‐ Magazine of Contemporary Drawing, which was recently presented at NYC's PS1. Lotte Konow Lund, who is currently working towards a solo show at the Vigeland Museum in Oslo, contributes Good Greed, a series of 13 drawings where she imagines what Gordon Gekko's art collection might look like today: by quoting other artists, she creates a send up of the capitalist incarnate's view of life and art. Having just completed a solo show at the Platform China Contemporary Art Institute in Beijing, Ane Graff shows her exquisite renderings of the surface and structure of organic mass, while Kristin Skrivervik offers her sparse and graceful visual interpretations of Rupert Sheldrake's theory of morphic resonance. Also deceptively simple at first sight are Lars Strandh's monochromes, which are currently on view at the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art, as well as in galleries in Sweden, Germany, Switzerland, and Tennessee. Finn Graff, a 73‐year old Nestor of the Norwegian art world knighted with the Royal Order of St. Olav, exhibits one of his summarily elegant, but merciless portraits. Another witty take on the human form is Tail by Anki King, who recently won the 2010 London International Creative Award. Kurt Johannessen, the pioneering performance artist whose books and text pieces are featured throughout the NORTH STARS series, will show a suite of drawings created while blindfolded. Als included in each chapter are works by Sol Kjøk and Rune Olsen, whose original paper sculpture titled Rattus Norvegicus proved so compelling that it was stolen from the 2005 Istanbul Biennial. In memoriam of this lost piece, a bronze version of the original is currently on display at .NO.
[Image: "In Quarantine" performance by Agnes Nerdregard]
Media
Schedule
from March 04, 2011 to March 31, 2011
Performance by Agnes Nerdregard at 18:30.
Opening Reception on 2011-03-04 from 18:00 to 20:00