ART-PRESENTATION:The Lorck Schive Kunstpris 2021

The Lorck Schive Kunstpris is a collaboration between Christian Lorck Schive and Spouse Trust and Trondheim kunstmuseum. The purpose of the Lorck Schive Kunstpris is to generate debate and interest around contemporary art. The prize exhibition is held at Trondheim kunstmuseum every second year. The first exhibition took place in 2013.

By Efi Michalarou
Photo: Trondheim kunstmuseum Archive

Founded in 1845, Trondheim kunstmuseum houses one of Norway’s largest public collections with key works of Norwegian 19th and 20th century art, as well as works by important international figures. The four artists nominated to the Lorck Schive Kunstpris 2021 all represent the spearhead of Norwegian contemporary art and will make new works of art for an exhibition that opens in March 2021 in TKM Bispegata. The Lorck Schive Kunstpris has received international attention for its unique collocation and presentation of the best contemporary art in Norway today and there is no reason to doubt that the coming exhibition shall do the same. The prize exhibition can be seen at Trondheim kunstmuseum from March 20 to September 19, 2021.In August, one of the nominated artists will be announced as the recipient of Lorck Schive Kunstpris 2021 at a prize ceremony at Trondheim kunstmuseum, after being selected by an international jury. This year the jury consists of Bente Sæthrang, Maaretta Jaukkuri and Nadim Samman. Tori Wrånes is a visual artist and vocalist, and she works with sculpture, performance, sound, and installation. The works may be described as dreamlike and surrealist. Wrånes herself says that she “draws with sound”, as when she places opera singers on bikes, musicians in a ski lift or when she herself hangs at the far end of a crane, 40 meters above the ground, singing a duet with the bells of the Oslo City Hall. Wrånes often moves beyond the ordinary. Kira Wager as dedicated herself to painting since her mid-teens. As she sees it, her artistic practice is based on intuition as well as on questioning painterly methods. The dialogue between painting and photography is one of the characteristics of Wager’s works. To a varying extent she turns the motifs almost abstract and distorts them in a complex play of formal means, for instance grids. She is concerned with our inner images and how our perception is influenced by memories. Steinar Haga Kristensen works with a wide range of media and formats; painting, sculpture, video, performance etc. His practice is marked by a sort of auto-excavation or digestion where the artist repetitively uses his own artistic activity and motifs as a basis for new repetitions, regardless of media and thematic. His works operate in an anarchist expression which discusses art, form, and meaning, for instance in the frescoes “Konsensusbilde” (consensus image) which was produced in Oslo City Hall in 2013 – 2015, as a backdrop for a new opera, composed by Haga Kristensen himself. In the libretto one is guided through an artist’s efforts to complete a commission which is supposed to reflect our own times, which is no longer concerned with that which is great or monumental, but rather focuses on the private and individual. This comprehensive work of art, which has hence become a permanent but hidden part of the city hall, exemplifies how Haga Kristensen in his practice challenges basic conventions for how art finds its place in society and the relationship between an artwork and the viewer. Matias Faldbakken is an author and visual artist. As an artist he works with a number of media: sculpture, drawing, video, and collage. The basis for all his art is his interest in countercultural expressions and conflict, and Faldbakken’s works often problematize themes like artistic freedom and freedom of speech. He uses mass produced containers and everyday materials as starting points for his sculptural works. Bags, cupboards, and bottles lose their original function through breaking, cutting and new constellations. In a similar way, Faldbakken is preoccupied with the possibilities for language to contain something, how content can be deciphered layer by layer, but also how it can be turned inside out and be linked to a new context. Faldbakken’s artistic projects may perhaps be summed up as follows: What is antagonism?

Photo: Tori Wrånes, Gratulerer / Kondodeler, 2021, Photo: sussan Jamtoy / TKM

Info: Trondheim kunstmuseum-TKM Bispegata, Bispegata 7b, Trondheim, Duration: 20/3-19/9/2021, Days & Hours: Wed 12:00-20:00, Thu-Sun 12:00-16:00, https://trondheimkunstmuseum.no