25/2 – 3/3, 2023
Don’t look at me gallery
Curated by Kajsa Karlsson
Don’t look at me gallery is an exhibition series that takes place in a basement in Amager. The gallery has a limited visibility, which gives the artists the opportunity to show works that they might not really want to show. I expect it to be personal, uncertain, fragile, uncertain and with a great risk, maybe even a risk of it being bad. The address is somewhat secret, the opening hours are spontaneous, variable and sometimes impractical. Those living in the house above the basement are invited, but beyond that, communication about address and time will be limited. I’ve talked a little about my project now and then in and of itself, but more in broad terms, I’ve tried to avoid mentioning any date or exact address. For about an hour there has been a post on instagram visible. A friend asked me about time and place, expressed with such certainty that it is something I should be able to inform about so then I just answered. A friend pointed out that it’s fun to celebrate an exhibition, and it’s true, so I couldn’t stop myself from giving out the information. I had also previously promised to invite a former teacher who gave me feedback about the project. After all, there are only a few people who have received the information about where and when.
Bildsyner (Postcard Paintings)
Artist Oskar Persson
Not many people will find this place, I try to assure Oskar Persson. He feels insecure about showing these postcards that we have placed in the room in the basement. They’re not so conceptual, they’re kind of… hard to write about. They are not like what he usually makes in the studio. They are created at home, after the working hours. Sitting at home, he’s too tired to make any thought through decisions. Things just happens and ha has little control over the creative process. It’s playing, it’s a dancing, It’s wonderful. It’s actually fun! It’s not work.
I think he has managed to create some freedom, not in his working day, but after it. One might think that it was free to work with art, but even free artists may have to seek freedom, not always in the art, but outside it, or in close connection with it.
Sometimes creations are discovered that artists have created and kept secret. It can be many years after they have passed away that it turns out that there are paintings that the artist signed with a different name, objects that the artist created and hid away in a basement. Me and Persson have talked about this and Persson has shown a clear interest in them, but also an understanding to that some of these things have had to be hidden away. There are things that are too decorative, naive, beautiful, salable/unsalable, provocative or boring to be presented to the art world.
I asked Persson if he had something secret like that that cannot be shown apart from the postcards, because they can obviously be shown. He has shown them to me and to others. He has shown them and explained that they cannot be shown, in this way they can be shown. This is something that can be written about, that they cannot be shown. It turns out that in addition to the postcards, there is a censored painting. The painting was painted by his father and it is so ugly that it looks like it’s by intent. This quality made it fit into Persson’s concept when he was going to show his graduation exhibition. His father was not happy about this and agonized over it. Somehow the decision was made not to include this painting. To be honest, I don’t really know what a painting that is intentionally ugly looks like? I think quite a few paintings are ugly, but most of the time it looks like they are by mistake and that is why they are so ugly. I think ugly paintings are quit provocative and the fact that they can just appear at any time is stressful. I get curious. How ugly is this painting? Can we find a way to include it in the exhibition?
After a bit of back and forth, we have come to the conclusion that if there are enough few people at the opening, a small showing of the painting can take place, but only for a short time. It will wait by itself at the office, a room a few meters away from the exhibition space. So possibly, during the opening, we can make a little excursion walk to see it, in its full ugliness. Surely enhanced by the chaos of the ugly office and the uncomfortable atmosphere when almost no one showed up for bubbles, cake and speeches, we are standing there by ourselves at the opening, relieved, but maybe also a little…. quiet… calm…. safe!
There is a third episode in the story of Persson’s awkward creative processes. There are videos that he makes and sends to a friend. Apparently they are excruciatingly bad. He has told us about the process and there is nothing wrong with it, maybe a bit fast. If possible, they are even more intuitive than the postcard paintings. We haven’t talked much about them beyond that and Persson looks uncomfortable when they are mentioned. Maybe we could have a little showing of them too. On a very small screen, a phone, maybe later in the evening. Or they cannot be shown at all.