Lars Bohman Gallery is proud to present PART II of Bjarne Melgaard’s exhibition The Sadistic Skater which is his sixth solo show at the gallery.
Bjarne Melgaard started out in the mid 1990’s with a neo expressionistic, frantic style of painting, sculpture and installation. His intense way of almost attacking the canvas with paint paired with a total control of the line where the brush strokes and splashes of paint form a base for an explicit and sometimes offensive narrative. Organized chaos is one of the main principles both regarding composition and content. Melgaard 's way of focusing on capturing the tension of the creative moment makes his stylistic role models, like Edward Munch and Jean Dubuffet ever present. The variety of dazzling layers in different techniques gives the works a painterly quality that literally sweep the viewer into a myriad of color form and expression.
Bjarne Melgaard’s art deals with the dark side of humanity, such as self-destruction, deviant sexuality and odd religious beliefs. It provides an insight into subcultures and parallel worlds that exists alongside the world of normality. It often discusses, investigates and pushes the boundaries of societal acceptance. The work tells the story of exclusion and fear and it raises questions about instinct and passion, morality and normality.
A male subject that can be seen as one of the artist’s many alter egos often populates the complex and chaotic imagery. As a viewer you sometimes feel like a voyeur with total access to a strangers most intimate sphere.
The same motifs and references appear over and over in Melgaards imagery almost as an obsession; the ape, the dog, black holes and male genitals. It’s almost as if the artist is trying to convince his audience by pounding his vision into their minds and it is not entirely without success - Bjarne Melgaard's art leaves few unmoved.
Bjarne Melgaard was born in 1967 in Sydney. He lives and works in New York. He was trained as an artist in Holland, first at the Jan van Eyck Academie in Maastricht (1991-1992) and later at the Rijksacademie in Amsterdam (1992-1993). He is represented at Museum of Modern Art, New York; Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam; Moderna Museet, Stockholm; Malmö Konstmuseum, Malmö; Magasin 3 Stockholm Konsthall, Stockholm; Statens Museum for Kunst, Copenhagen; Astrup Fearnley Museum of Contemporary Art, Oslo; Kiasma Museum of Contemporary Art, Helsinki; Musée Moderne de la Ville, Strasbourg, S.M.A.K., Ghent and Kunsthalle zu Kiel, Kiel.
Bjarne Melgaard started out in the mid 1990’s with a neo expressionistic, frantic style of painting, sculpture and installation. His intense way of almost attacking the canvas with paint paired with a total control of the line where the brush strokes and splashes of paint form a base for an explicit and sometimes offensive narrative. Organized chaos is one of the main principles both regarding composition and content. Melgaard 's way of focusing on capturing the tension of the creative moment makes his stylistic role models, like Edward Munch and Jean Dubuffet ever present. The variety of dazzling layers in different techniques gives the works a painterly quality that literally sweep the viewer into a myriad of color form and expression.
Bjarne Melgaard’s art deals with the dark side of humanity, such as self-destruction, deviant sexuality and odd religious beliefs. It provides an insight into subcultures and parallel worlds that exists alongside the world of normality. It often discusses, investigates and pushes the boundaries of societal acceptance. The work tells the story of exclusion and fear and it raises questions about instinct and passion, morality and normality.
A male subject that can be seen as one of the artist’s many alter egos often populates the complex and chaotic imagery. As a viewer you sometimes feel like a voyeur with total access to a strangers most intimate sphere.
The same motifs and references appear over and over in Melgaards imagery almost as an obsession; the ape, the dog, black holes and male genitals. It’s almost as if the artist is trying to convince his audience by pounding his vision into their minds and it is not entirely without success - Bjarne Melgaard's art leaves few unmoved.
Bjarne Melgaard was born in 1967 in Sydney. He lives and works in New York. He was trained as an artist in Holland, first at the Jan van Eyck Academie in Maastricht (1991-1992) and later at the Rijksacademie in Amsterdam (1992-1993). He is represented at Museum of Modern Art, New York; Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam; Moderna Museet, Stockholm; Malmö Konstmuseum, Malmö; Magasin 3 Stockholm Konsthall, Stockholm; Statens Museum for Kunst, Copenhagen; Astrup Fearnley Museum of Contemporary Art, Oslo; Kiasma Museum of Contemporary Art, Helsinki; Musée Moderne de la Ville, Strasbourg, S.M.A.K., Ghent and Kunsthalle zu Kiel, Kiel.