SUMMER SHOW 2024

NILS STÆRK is pleased to present this year’s Summer Show. The exhibition brings together works by nine artists from the gallery’s program, spanning various mediums while sharing a conceptual narrative. On view are works by Darío Escobar, Paul Fägerskiöld, FOS, Mads Gamdrup, Nils Erik Gjerdevik, Rebecca Lindsmyr, Lea Porsager, Matthew Ronay, and Tove Storch.

In his Composiciones Azules series, Darío Escobar uses amate paper, made from fig tree bark. The works utilize Maya blue, a historically significant color in Mesoamerican art, recently rediscovered and replicated. Escobar’s art intertwines Latin-American cultural elements with contemporary international aesthetics.

While the composition appears abstract, Pyongyang. View South. January 1 2100 by Paul Fägerskiöld is based on the calculated precision of astronomy. Using the computer software ‘Starry Night’, Fägerskiöld constructs his views of the cosmos. The program calculates views from any location on Earth and nearby galaxies at any date for thousands of years in the past, present, and future.

FOS’ Ruin is based on a scan of a Maltese ruin, downscaled and transformed into a sculpture. The sculpture explores the persistent presence of the past within the present, bridging historical and modern realities. It reflects FOS’ ongoing exploration of scale and temporality.

Mads Gamdrup’s stained glass paintings replace traditional photographic mediums with acrylic on hand-rolled glass. Through both monochrome and multicolored pieces, Gamdrup investigates light and color interplay, challenging perceptions of transparency and texture within the glass.

The works by Nils Erik Gjerdevik defy classical composition principles, blurring distinctions between foreground and background and challenging conventional perspectives. His paintings merge divergent ideas and movements into cohesive images, questioning traditional notions of harmony and composition.

In Sincerely Yours, Rebecca Lindsmyr delves into the written signature as both a symbolic expression and a bureaucratic marker of subjectivity. By deconstructing her own gestures, from childhood drawings to legal documents, she explores the interplay between language and art, examining the signature's role in self-identity and authenticity.

Lea Porsager’s Old, grey ICUnTS series explores the relationship between matter and spirit, delving into contemporary notions of spirituality. Using egg tempera, the paintings sample the forms of religious icons as a pictorial system to open the soul and reveal the divine. The works interweave fabulation and speculation, creating a dialogue on the nature of the spiritual.

Rooted in automaticdrawing, Matthew Ronay’s basswood sculptures allow the subconscious to guide his creations. By relinquishing control, Ronay taps into deeper layers of consciousness, inviting viewers into a realm where tangible forms and metaphysical energies merge.

Tove Storch’s sculptures are the tangible translation of a state of potentiality, where the intelligibility of material and form is employed to wedge and balance the inherent force of physical matter. In this process, which is open-ended and vividly metamorphic, the artist is both witness and accomplice. If, on the one side, she lends her hand to the establishment of the infrastructure, on the other she steps back and lets the forces at play take their course.