PAST EXHIBITIONS:

HEATHER CANTRELL, ALEXANDER GUTKE, NILS ERIK GJERDEVIK,  MARTIN KOBE, MARK AERIEL WALLER, MARKUS SIXAY, ASTRID SVANGREN, GITTE VILLESEN 

Opening Reception Tuesday, July 8, 6 - 8 PM

curated by SOFIA BERTILSSON

SUITE 106 Gallery has invited Sofia Bertilsson, Swedish curator and director of Nordenhake Gallery in Berlin, to organize this year’s summer group exhibition. Bertilsson has chosen works made mostly by young Northern European artists. These artists’ diverse work shares a will or an urge to explore contemporary life, and occasionally the mundane, through narrative.

Markus Sixay works within a personal narrative. His autobiographical pieces range from simple cartoonish drawings that sardonically comment on the art world in which he lives and works to an installation of confetti that weighs the same amount as his own body mass. Astrid Svangren’s abstract paintings are filled with fashion-clad figures whose narratives echo Japanese paintings. Yet, Svangren’s characters’ contemporary clothes and style keep them part of her own world. Mark Aeriel Waller reworks classic Greek myths. In his video “White Stag,” Ovid’s story of Diana and Actaeon is situated in the desolate modern-day watering hole – the swimming pool. Gitte Villesen shoots documentary style footage. Villesen captures on film narratives of people pursuing their ultimate dreams and aspirations. Heather Cantrell, the only non-European in the show, photographs landscapes of sites associated with haunting tales. Her landscapes manage to convey the mysterious and horrific stories that lurk behind the scenes.

“Wild Strawberries and Favorite Haunts” loosely refers to Ingmar Bergman’s classic film of 1957. Bertilsson parallels the experience of this exhibition with the journey of the protagonist, an old professor, who travels through the Scandinavian landscape seemingly moving forward in time, yet constantly lapsing into dreams and recollections of his past.