Bottles in wood, 2006, oil paint on canvas, 150 x 240 cm

The day after, 2006, oil paint, spray can  on canvas, 150 x 240 cm

Girl in wood,2006,  glazed ceramics, 36 x 32 x 29 cm

Sunlight above evergreen trees 2006,  glazed ceramics, 45 x 32 x 29 cm

The face of the wood, 2006,  oil paint, 140 x 120 cm

The exhibition is a wide selection of new cross-media media works consisting of ceramic sculptures, drawings, and brand new collages on canvas made in a combination of glazed ceramics, paint and photo prints.

Mette Vangsgaard plays in her works with nostalgic references to express memories from her background, while at the same time experimenting with the use and fusion of different media and materials.The balance between a narrative voice in the works and a look into the possibilities of materials is of great interest to the artist.

In Lemon Moon, Mette Vangsgaard takes us back to her childhood memories from growing up in a small town miles from anywhere with all that implies of village originals, farm animals and rural ambience. In a new series of small drawings, we are presented for numerous portraits of originals and bumpkins, each with their own history from the small town. And in the same manner in one of Vangsgaard’s new ceramic sculptures we are also presented for a large pig surrounded by cream puffs and doughnuts, as a relic from the artist’s memory of a neighboring pig, which was only fed with cakes. Hence the poetic title of her show thus refers both to the typical Danish lemon cake, Citronmåne and the dark starry nights you will only find in the countryside, where the moon is shining strongly on the sky.

The fact that Vangsgaard works figuratively with materials, makes her art complex to categorize with a technical term. The combination of fragmented and textural materials to describe and remember a past, which is real, can be characterized as new materialism in art or experimentation with the conditions of an object.

Without using photographic material to develop these works, she creates them from a personal memory. The ceramic sculptures, the so-called glazed stoneware, and the collages on paper and canvas fix past moments in Vangsgaard’s life. Through the works for this exhibition at Marie Kirkegaard Gallery she expresses a fascination of surroundings, places, settings, and of capturing atmosphere and ambiance. In her own unique way, and through a curiosity towards sensuous abilities in physical materials, she characterizes environments in her work. By playing with the conditions of objects, the artist also draws attention to human conditions, memory and perception.

Mette Vangsgaard (b. 1968) currently lives and works in Copenhagen, Denmark. She graduated from The Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts in 1996, and in 2011 she was awarded the 3-Year Working Grant from The Danish Arts Council. Lemon Moon is Mette Vangsgaard’s second solo show with Marie Kirkegaard in the gallery.

 Vangsgaard’s works have previously been shown at national as well as international venues, such as: Kunsthal Nord, Aalborg; Estrany – de la Mota, Barcelona; Overgaden Institute of Contemporary Art, Copenhagen; Sophienholm, Kgs. Lyngby; Chinese European Art Center, Xiamen; Kunsthallen Brandts, Odense; Vejen Museum of Art, Denmark; Trapholt Museum of Modern Art, Denmark; Beaver Projects, Copenhagen, Galerie Mikael Andersen, Copenhagen; Centro de Art Santa Monica, Barcelona – among others.

Photo: Ole Houpt