Jonas Malmberg in his studio. Photo courtesy of the artist and the gallery.
About the artist
"In my practice I weave together a visual thread of photography, art history and my own experiences through painting. My paintings depict nature as something both familiar and at the same time foreign. The identity of the nature that is pictured in my paintings is a blend of romantic landscape tradition intertwined with exotic animals that hardly belong in Scandinavian fauna. In this way a hint is given about the globalized world in which we live in and that the way in which we experience nature is not always analogous, and is made unfamiliar by a diverse flow of photographs, documentaries and by our travel combined by the fact that we can’t help giving animals human traits: a lone wolf, a brave lion, a bird on a branch as a picture of freedom. Thus, my paintings confront my own reality. Suggestive memories turn into dreamlike logic."
-JM
Works in the exhibition
Jonas Malmberg
Untitled, 2020
Oil on mdf
79×60 cm
Photo: © Olof Nimar
Jonas Malmberg
Untitled, 2020
Oil on mdf
25×21 cm
Photo: © Olof Nimar
About this work
The two paintings by artist Jonas Malmberg included in the exhibition refer to the way flora and fauna are presented and represented to us via a multiplicity of mediums and images of sorts. The smaller painting could be a fragment of a luscious garden as well as one of William Morris' popular wallpapers, though not catering to the bright and colourful language of commercial language. Malmberg's painting of a monkey is equally rendered in a mysterious palette which could evoke late night Scandinavian light as well as occasional glows that even though may come from the pigments and oils he uses at the studio, could also reference –as a visitor to the gallery has mentioned– to the colours of petrol, suggesting a complex reading connected to questions about the fragile state of nature in the 21st century. The right hand corner depicts what appears to be a swan swallowing a fish, area of the painting that has caused significant curiosity amongst the audience.
