Harmony of colour
A new exhibition exposes and exploits the mechanics of colour and light
Published: 6/01/2011 at 12:00 AM

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Harmony exists in the space between two different mechanisms. In "Eugene Delacroix Taught Me How To Understand Colour Harmony", which opens tomorrow at VER Gallery, Swedish artist Carl Michael Von Hausswolff oscillates between the creation of sonic experimentation and contextual strategy, while his colleague Torbjorn Johansson shows a sustained fascination with the natural wonders of light and the colour spectrum. Together in the exhibition they expose and exploit the mechanics of colour. The exhibition explores colour as focus, colour as a medium and colour as an experience.
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'Eugene Delacroix Taught Me How To Understand Colour Harmony' by Carl Michael Von Hausswolff and Torbjorn Johansson.
"Eugene Delacroix Taught Me How To Understand Colour Harmony" addresses certain dynamics where simple gestures suggest an alteration and a politicisation of temporal and spatial conditions inherent in the work, and those between the artwork and the viewer. This is manifested in the content and in the formal structure of the work.
Johansson plays with the notion of colour as a decisive factor in our perception of the realities that surround us. It is the open relationship among his works that creates an environment in which to hold a dialogue with the architecture of the gallery; to engage the process where it is difficult to determine where the work ends and another begins.
His works, which are characterised by a sense of playfulness, humour and social involvement, focus on local situations, concrete materials and forms while providing a platform for translating his visual entities into a vast collage of compelling imagery. With drips of paint, blobs turn into paintings. Through video projection, familiar objects metamorphose and reappear, allowing us to view them from a new perspective. Site-specific installations link the outside world with the interior space, with the natural elements, and its structure through colour.
In Hausswolff's ongoing Red series, the artist uses photography not as an act of documentation but rather as a surface on which he activates spaces and loads them with various meanings. For many years, Hausswolff has continued to explore the possibility of exposing different architectural and topographical settings using high-voltage red light. By photographing different settings, the image itself, or rather its subject, emanates through the means by which it is conveyed.
In this exhibition, even though the photographs offer no reference other than the viewer's own, the illuminating images take on an installation dimension, which leads the two-dimensionality of the printed matter to create a dialogue with the three-dimensionality of the gallery. Hassuwolff's audio frequencies texture the gallery as a sonic structure, as well.
Collaborating closely, the two artists present a unique colouristic composition.