Past

Svend Danielsen: Under linjen

24 Aug – 20 Oct 2018

The work of Svend Danielsen unites the long, heavy traditions of painting with a Fluxus-like spontaneity and interest in the mundane. Within this range, he has spent decades investigating and challenging the conventions of genre and expectations of what art is, persistently pushing the artwork and artistic method to the borders of both.

With the solo exhibition Under linjen (‘Under the line’) Svend Danielsen presents a wide selection of new works located in the field between image and object, representing a broad survey of his oeuvre. With painting as his starting point, Danielsen has added numerous media to his practice, although painting still forms a clear connecting thread, and also occupies a central role in this exhibition. Via expressive brushstrokes the artist converts concrete impressions into evocative abstractions – an assured yet persistently curious and inquiring study of materiality, rhythm, colour and line. Whilst some of the works are minimalist and ethereal, others are dark and dense. Despite the different expressive forms, a consistent focus on opening the surface of the painting can be sensed, creating depth and spatiality through a precise gauging of tones and hues, of gravity and lightness. Beneath the understatement and apparent nonchalance lies a rich mesh of references to different painting styles and epochs, to which Danielsen adds his distinctive stamp, using, for example, a base of rococo ochre tones as the background for the blue contours of the pockets of a pair of jeans.