Press Release Kvadrat art collaborations Fall 2018 This fall Kvadrat launches three new art collaborations: Take My Breath Away by the Vietnamese-born Danish contemporary artist Danh Vo in The National Gallery of Denmark, a special commission for the Kvadrat headquarters by Swedish artist Karl Holmqvist and Sweet Feast by Ulla von Brandenburg in London s Whitechapel Gallery. Danh Vo: Take My Breath Away From 30 August 2 December, The National Gallery of Denmark (SMK) presents a large-scale retrospective featuring one of Denmark s most internationally acclaimed artists: Danh Vo (b. 1975). Composed of more than 75 pieces of art including several new works produced especially for SMK Take My Breath Away is the most comprehensive overview of Danh Vo s artistic practice. While the exhibition fills the museum s exhibition rooms, the artist has also taken over the museum s Sculpture Street for a very special project. In his art, Danh Vo often uses his personal history as the starting point for discussing universal themes such as migration, globalisation and desire. He has an exceptional ability to lift existing objects out of their original context, and interweave them to form new narratives about identity and culture. A longtime admirer of Nanna Ditzel, Danh Vo has in collaboration with Kvadrat delved into the archives of the prominent designer. Together with Kvadrat s Design Director Stine Find Osther, he rediscovered Mega: which Kvadrat has especially produced for this exhibition. Mega is used for the Enzo Mari-inspired round daybeds and for the specially designed cushion sculpture decorating the museum s vast stage. The exhibition is curated in collaboration with The Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation of New York. Danh Vo: Take My Breath Away Statens Museum for Kunst, Copenhagen 30 September 2 December 2018
About Danh Vo Danh (pronounced Ya:n) Vo was born in Vietnam in 1975 and arrived in Denmark at the age of four. Hoping to reach the USA, Vo and his family had fled Vietnam on a boat, when they were picked up by a Maersk vessel in the Pacific Ocean and taken to Denmark. Danh Vo is a graduate from the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts and the Städelschule in Frankfurt. He has received the international art award Hugo Boss Prize and has presented solo shows across the world. Recent examples include the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York (2018), Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia, Madrid (2015-16); Museum Ludwig, Cologne (2015) and Museo Jumex, Mexico City (2014-15). In 2015 he represented Denmark at the Venice Bienniale. In May, Observer.com listed Vo as one of the artists who will change the world in 2018. About Statens Museum for Kunst (SMK) SMK is the largest art museum in Denmark. The collections show a rich and varied selection of art from the European classics of the Renaissance to the overwhelming diversity of modern and contemporary art. The history of the museum is inextricably bound up with the history of the art collections amassed by Danish monarchs. That is why the story of the museum does not begin with the building in Sølvgade, but hundreds of years before that with the art chambers of the Danish monarchs. SMK is especially famous for its beautiful collection of Danish Golden Age art, the country s most comprehensive collection of Danish contemporary art and one of the world s best Matisse collections.
Karl Holmqvist This Autumn Kvadrat will present the art installation Untitled ( WHAT? WHEN, WHY, WHO? ) by Swedish artist Karl Holmqvist, who has been invited to engage with the world of textiles and the spaces of our Ebeltoft headquarters. As part of the commission Karl Holmqvist designed the customized textile Verpan featuring six variations of word-based patterns. These create a sculpture composed of twenty-seven cubes, which can be randomly placed creating varying combinations of words. On the occasion of the launch the 13th of September, Karl Holmqvist will present a spoken word performance based on readings of his own poetry, video and sound in collaboration with the artists FOS and Ida Ekblad. About Karl Holmqvist Karl Holmqvist is known for using a wide range of formats poetry readings, installation, and sculpture to bring out the primal qualities of language. He is one of a current generation of artists working with language and text as a sculptural or performative material. His aim is to spark the creative process in the viewer, seeing his art and poetry as a translation of the complexities of contemporary life. He blends poetry with pop music and his texts, composed of anecdotes as famous as they are diverse, explore the theme of communication and language. Holmqvist s recent one-person exhibitions include Centre d Art Contemporaine, Geneva, Indipendenza, Rome (with Klara Liden), Kunstverein Braunschweig (with Klara Liden), Power Station, Dallas and Camden Arts Centre, London. He has participated in the Venice Biennial in 2003 and 2011, and Performa, New York in 2005, 2007 and 2013. In 2013 he received the Arthur Köpke Memory Fund Award.
Ulla von Brandenburg: Sweet Feast Sweet Feast is a new commission by artist Ulla von Brandenburg (b. 1974, Germany), in partnership with Le Prix Marcel Duchamp. Sweet Feast features a new film screened for six months in Whitechapel Gallery s ground floor gallery. Visitors of all ages are invited to take a seat and watch on a large, colourful structure designed by the artist upholstered in Kvadrat s Divina. The historic exhibition Sweets was Whitechapel Gallery s contribution to the Fanfare for Europe celebrations. It featured an irresistible display of confectionary from European Common Market members included Belgian chocolate coins, French lollipops shaped as the Eiffel Tower, gummy mice from Germany, coffee-flavoured Hopjes from Holland, Italian marzipan fruits, salty licorice from Denmark, Irish mints and toffee from Yorkshire. According to archive records on 28 January 1973, the last day of the exhibition, 500 children visited to learn about sweets as popular art. The children were invited to sample specially selected candies donated by some of the manufacturers. In their enthusiasm, they overwhelmed the only guard on duty and devoured all the displays. This summer Ulla von Brandenburg recorded a re-staging of this curious incident, working with the participation of children from local primary school Arnhem Wharf. The film includes a song co-written by the children and artist. Sweet Feast is informed by the context of the original exhibition, staged at a time when new educational methods considering children as individuals emerged and against a political backdrop of anti-establishment movements, struggles for freedom and civil rights. It also considers opportunities for the next generation, during a period dominated by conversations about the future impact of Brexit. Ulla von Brandenburg: Sweet Feast Whitechapel Gallery, London 21 September 2018 31 March 2019
About Ulla von Brandenburg Ulla von Brandenburg (b. 1974, Karlsruhe Germany) has a multifaceted practice that is realised through a combination of black & white film, installation, performance, drawing, and painting. She lives and works in Paris. Recent major solo exhibitions have been presented at such venues as Pérez Art Museum Miami, Miami (2016); Power Plant, Toronto (2016); Haus Konstruktiv, Zurich (2016); ACCA, Melbourne (2016); Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis, St. Louis (2015); MAMCO, Geneva (2014); Kunstverein Hannover, Hannover (2014); Kunsthaus Hamburg, Hamburg (2013); Kunsthalle Hamburg, Hamburg (2013); The Common Guild, Glasgow (2011); Chisenhale Gallery, London (2009); Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin (2008). Significant group exhibitions have been presented at: Centre Pompidou, Paris (2016); Performa 15, New York (2015); Fondation Louis Vuitton, Paris (2015); MAMCO, Geneva (2015); CAC, Vilnius (2014); 19th Biennale of Sydney, Sydney (2014); Witte de With, Rotterdam (2014); The Power Plant, Toronto (2012); Schirn Kunsthalle, Frankurt (2011); Museum of Contemporary Art, Detroit (2010); Tate Modern, London (2007). In 2016 von Brandenburg was nominated for the Prix Marcel Duchamp. Previously she has been awarded the Finkenwerder Art Prize (2013); shortlisted for Daniel and Florence Guerlain Contemporary Art Foundation s 2013 Drawing Prize (2013); Kunstpreis der Boettcherstrasse, Kunsthalle Bremen (2007); Cité des Arts, Paris (2007); Arbeitsstipendium Jürgen-Ponto-Stiftung (2006); Reisestipendium, Verein für Neue Kunst in Hamburg (2005); Stipendium Künstlerstätte Schloss Bleckede (2005); Begabtenstipendium der Dietzte-Stiftung (2003). About Whitechapel Gallery For over a century the Whitechapel Gallery has premiered world class artists from modern masters such as Pablo Picasso, Jackson Pollock, Mark Rothko and Frida Kahlo to contemporaries such as Sophie Calle, Lucian Freud, Gilbert & George and Mark Wallinger. With beautiful galleries, exhibitions, artist commissions, collection displays, historic archives, education resources, inspiring art courses, dining room and bookshop, the Gallery is open all year round, so there is always something free to see. It is a touchstone for contemporary art internationally, plays a central role in London s cultural landscape and is pivotal to the continued growth of the world s most vibrant contemporary art quarter.
About Kvadrat Kvadrat was established in Denmark in 1968 and has deep roots in Scandinavia s design tradition. Kvadrat continuously works to expand the aesthetic, technological, and artistic boundaries of the use of textiles through a long series of collaborations with some of the world s best designers, architects, and artists, including Tord Boontje, Miriam Bäckström, Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec, Thomas Demand, Olafur Eliasson, Alfredo Häberli, Akira Minagawa, and Peter Saville. Art projects include Pipilotti Rist at New Museum, New York (2016); Philippe Parreno at Tate Modern, London (2016); Joana Vasconscelos, AroS, Aarhus (2016); Goshka Macuga at Fondazione Prada, Milan (2016); Jesper Just at Palais de Tokyo, Paris (2015); Shilpa Gupta at la Biennale di Venezia, Venice (2015); Günther Vogt and Olafur Eliasson at Your Glacial Expectations, Kvadrat Headquarters, Ebeltoft (2012); and Thomas Demand at Städel Museum s Metzler Hall, Frankfurt (2011). From 2015, Kvadrat has been collaborating with South into North for the curatorial development of the company s art strategy. For further information, please contact press@kvadrat.org Kvadrat.dk