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23.08.25- Björkholmen Gallery – Lisa Lundgren
Dagarna – May 06 to June 17, 2023 – Jakobsgatan 27C – Opening hours Tue-Fri 12-17, Sat 12-16
ABOUT the artist
Lisa Lundgren’s paintings are at once direct and enigmatic. The motif’s dreamy narrative is presented through the artist’s very distinguishable expression. The saturated color scale on the coarse linen canvas enhances a sense of tactility and adds an extra dimension to the works. The viewer is invited to a hidden scenery through a passage. The backdrop often opens up to an imagery such as a distant landscape or a mystical unknown, appearing in distorted perspectives. Lundgrens works are characterized by a visual intimacy that defies interpretation, inspiring the spectator to serenity and contemplation. https://www.lisa-lundgren.com/
ABOUT the exhibition
12 paintings. Which are twelve images. Which can be twelve months. Which can be a year. Elapsed time – time that elapses.
All the paintings have the same subject – a tree. They have no specific order, and they are not the same tree in different forms. Yet, there’s much in common. They all share the same format. They all have a framing element in the image that marks three sides. The framing of the image underscores the two-dimensionality of the paintings, making them indexical, representing something beyond themselves; they are part of a system. A tree as a subject might seem like a simple, almost banal, choice of subject for a painting. However, when each tree is tasked with being specific, possessing values and qualities unique to that tree, they become characters to us. They acquire distinct and special expressions and become actors where the surface of the painting becomes their stage. At times, they carry a possible mythology, sometimes depicted more literally and in an everyday manner. Yet, they appear to us mostly as parts taken from a larger context. They could have been details from backgrounds of older paintings that have been extracted, isolated, and given renewed attention. The detail from a larger context becomes what’s placed before our eyes.
Lundgren’s paintings always have a limitation. The paintings are strictly organized into fields and frames. The composition makes the viewer seem to look through a door (rather than the classical window of painting). In previous works, it has often been a curtain or a stylized scene that creates the distance. Both for us as viewers of the paintings and for the artist herself, who positions herself at a place where she can gaze into the painting from a position precisely at the painting’s interface. In the new paintings, the limitation is present in the form of a thin frame around most of the painting. It’s more subdued, yet it still exists as a way to position us as viewers in relation to the content of the image. We still see two images in one. In Lisa Lundgren’s painting, the pictorial space is two-dimensional. She uses the surface of painting as a place to position her subjects and narratives. The color is often thinly applied, and together with the transparent ground, it forms a fine grid pattern where the painting becomes both material and image. Her painting can be understood as closely connected to its material and how that material is treated. It’s not about illusion – the painting is a story about itself.
Lisa Lundgren’s new paintings are a meditation on what painting is, what components a painting can consist of, and the history of these elements. It’s a meditation on the material, the practice, and the subject. Painting as elapsed time.
Thomas Elovsson
ABOUT the gallery
Björkholmen Gallery is an active Stockholm-based established Private Gallery. Björkholmen Gallery is a 26 year old Private Gallery showing mostly Painting with a focus on Arte Povera.
Since they were established in 1995 they have had at least 104 exhibitions (74 solo shows and 30 group shows) with 84 artists (for more information, see shows).
Björkholmen Gallery participated in no less than 9 art fairs, in Stockholm, Stockholm and elsewhere. The first fair Björkholmen Gallery participated in was Stockholm Smart Show 1997 in Stockholm in 1997. They have most frequently exhibited with MARKET in Stockholm, Sweden (7 times) and Stockholm Smart Show in Stockholm, Sweden (1 times).
Björkholmen Gallery’s first verified exhibition was “Thomas Ruff” in Stockholm in 2000 with the artist Thomas Ruff. Björkholmen Gallery mostly shows artists from Sweden, but they also exhibit artists from the United States, Germany and elsewhere. Exhibitions are mostly male (75%), with female artists exhibited less (24%). The most exhibited artist is Hans Isaksson. The average age of artists shown at Björkholmen Gallery is 46.
The current average rank for artists at Björkholmen Gallery is 29,505, with 1 artists among the top 1,000.
The highest-ranked artists to exhibit with Björkholmen Gallery are Cindy Sherman (ranked in Top 10) and Thomas Ruff (ranked in Top 100) . Of the 277 artists that have repeatedly exhibited with Björkholmen Gallery, 250 improved their rank while at Björkholmen Gallery. Björkholmen Gallery discovered no artists currently in the top 100, one artists currently in the top 1,000 and no artists currently in the top 10,000. https://bjorkholmengallery.com/