RISK(U) #7 with Diana Agunbiade-Kolawole and Johan Franzén
The Nordic Guest Studio, Malongen, Nytorget 15A
Thursday 2 sept 5:30 - 8:00 pm
Welcome to an informal talk with Diana Agunbiade-Kolawole and Johan Franzén about their project Sleeping and brushing, snoring and flossing! There will be a presentation of sounds in progress accompanying photographs and drawings as well as an artist talk moderated by Jonas Böttern from 18:00-18:30.
STATEMENT:
For the RISK(U) artistic residency, Diana Agunbiade-Kolawole has invited Johan Franzén to develop an existing work of portraiture in dialogue with each other. We see RISK(U) as an opportunity to have an intersection or a cross point to develop a process which has a core in our own individual artistic practices which then meets in dialogue with the other and moves elsewhere. This is a new instalment of the collaboration between Diana and Johan which started at the beginning of the Covid 19 pandemic.
Sleeping and brushing, snoring and flossing
A man brushes his teeth. A woman sleeps. They live in the same house. The man makes drawings of the sleeping woman. The woman takes photographs of the man brushing.
They get to see aspects of each other that's hidden from other people. Aspects and moments that are both private and banal at the same time - everyday rituals. You might say that they have become over-familiar with each other. The woman sleeping is not aware of being drawn - at least not during the time when the drawings are actually made. The man making the drawings probably oscillates between sheer observation and a feeling of trespassing, of being a voyeur. Of getting uncomfortably close to the woman, whose both not present and very much present. But the man being photographed brushing his teeth is very much aware of being photographed - so the act of brushing one's teeth becomes a performance. He might feel a bit like an actor brushing his teeth in a film. He might pose. He might take instructions. He might brush his teeth some minutes longer than he normally would, for the sake of the art. The woman taking the photographs might observe the act of brushing one's teeth in a way she never really has before. She might suddenly see it in a way she never has before, just like the man might see a sleeping face in a way he never has before.
BIO:
Diana Agunbiade-Kolawole is an artist working with photography. Her work utilises both lens and non-lens based photography, and these manifest themselves in a variety of outputs such as installations, performances, prints and moving image. She was selected as a British ambassador for UK/CHINA 400, an exchange of future leaders, China, 2009; Louis Vuitton Young Arts Project Summer Academy, UK, 2010; Multiplicidade festival, Brazil, 2013; artist-in-residence for Becontree Hundred, part of the 2012 Olympic games cultural legacy in 2015; Brucebo travel grant, Artist Residency at the Swedish Polar Research Secretariat, Abisko in 2017 and selected as part of the-dot 100 creative trailblazer in 2018. Agunbiade-Kolawole’s work has been shown at, amongst others, the Nigerian High Commission, London; Tate Britain, Centre Pompidou, Färgfabriken, Konstakademin, Växjö Konsthall, Hanaholmen, Finland; Galleri format, Malmö; Bonniers Konsthall, Galleri Thomassen and Loyal Gallery. Diana Agunbiade-Kolawole is a lecturer at Royal Institute of Art, Stockholm, Sweden.
Johan Franzén is a painter living and working in Stockholm, he is a graduate of Royal Institute of Art, Stockholm, Sweden. Solo exhibitions includes Project Room, Charlotte Lund Gallery, Stockholm; En hand är en halv bur / A Hand is Half a Cage, POM Gallery; Master show, Gallery Mejan, Stockholm. Some selected group exhibition are Masters Salon 2016 Painting, The Royal Academy of Antwerpen + Brussels, Belgium; Northern Comfort, fivehundredthousand gallery, London; By Fire by Force, Allkonstrummet, Stockholm, Sweden; Jeudi de Lumière, Espace 0, Brussels, Belgium; Encounters, Galleri Mejan, Stockholm, Sweden; SAK/Swedish Association for Art, Award Exhibition, Konstakademien, Stockholm, Sweden; Konstattack 4, Södra Teatern, Stockholm Sweden.