Lilja Lever (Petru Vølven)

Olafur Eliasson

Stalke Kunsthandel/Galleri, Vesterbrogade 14A

2-12. 1994  to 12.1 1995

PRESS RELEASE

Lilja Lives (Petru,Vølven)

On Friday, December 2, 1994, from 4 PM to 8 PM, Stalke Kunsthandel, Vesterbrogade 14a, 1620 Copenhagen V,

Opening of Olafur Eliasson's new works, consisting of a series of photos of stone patterns as well as a moss installation that recently garnered significant attention at the Cologne Art Fair earlier this month.

Olafur Eliasson began at the Academy in 1988, with stays in New York in 1991 and 1992, and has been based in Cologne, Germany, since the

summer of 1993, where his last solo exhibition was held in October 1994 at Lukas&Hoffmann Gallery, Cologne.

Olafur Eliasson works with installations and photographs. In Olafur Eliasson's works, there is no clear solution or "correct" way to interpret the piece. Rather, they are open works where the viewer's own experience and perception are central.

The works are often simple and minimalistic, where physical elements take a backseat in favor of more immaterial elements such as light, water, fire, gas, moss, and air.

Beyond the immediate organic elements' form referencing nature, there are layers of meaning or references behind them. Isolating the elements from their usual physical context and re-creating them in a new way, as Olafur Eliasson has previously done with a rainbow, an ice mirror, or a wall of moss, means that the immaterial aspects of the elements become central and therefore open to metaphorical meanings. For the viewer, the work is experienced much more mentally or even psychologically, rather than as a more traditional physical experience.

Olafur Eliasson has planned a solo project at Hamburg Kunstverein in 1995

The exhibition concludes on Thursday, January 12, 1995,

Opening hours: Wednesday to Friday from 2 PM to 6 PM, and by appointment.

Review

Art is often born out of a personal story, but in the dialectical ebb and flow of art, this varies over time. The personal, however, seems to be on the rise among the younger generation. This can also be seen in the talented young visual artist Olafur Eliasson, who presents an installation at Stalke Kunsthandel, rooted in private stories.

Yet, as personal as these works may be, they also become a confrontation between the classic dichotomy of nature and culture. It consists of photographs of Icelandic landscapes. In these landscapes are people who make a living selling peculiar stones, but included in the exhibition is a large photo cut from these foggy, crystalline worlds. We find in these stones something that resembles nature, but it is not. It is representation; it is imagery of nature. Nature, in fact, is disappearing.

Thus, it becomes all the more sacred to step into the artist's moss-filled space. There is an opening in the wall, entirely covered with moss. You can feel it, see it, smell it, but it is not nature. It is art in a basement in Copenhagen.

Torben Weirup

Berlingske Tidende 9.12 1994