Holly Hendry (UK), Michael Staniak (AUS), Jesper Skov Madsen (DK), Lene Baadsvig Ørmen (NO), Kristian Touborg (DK)

Galerie Mikael Andersen would like to welcome you to the opening of the group exhibition Nothing You Have to Understand with works by five Danish and International artists, Thursday the 15^th June 2017, 5-7 pm. Nothing You Have to Understand presents five exciting artists all working within an abstract field using new materials, technologies or processes. The exhibition showcases works that confront or challenge the notion, selection and treatment of the artists’ materials.

Holly Hendry’s (1990) works mix natural and synthetic materials; evoking imagery of both human intestines and an engine’s piston, making her sculpture Oesophageal Block seem almost cybernetic. Far from the robotic, Lene Baadsvig Ørmen’s (1984) sculptures of dirt and concrete combine figurative elements and industrial production to create works that looks almost fossilized, pointing simultaneously towards the past and the future.

In his works, Jesper Skov Madsen (1982) processes large copper plates with lacquer and pigments as well as industrial tools like angle grinders. The combination of the noble metal and the heavy tools creates an impressive installational work. Michael Staniak (1982) has created three almost monochrome works of casting compound and acrylic. Somewhere between painting and relief – between image and object – the works address the changing dynamics of images and materiality in modern digital culture. Kristian Touborg’s (1987) paintings drift towards the conceptual too; he combines painted as well as printed surfaces with iPhone photos in works that emanates from the painterly and the digital alike.

Nothing You Have to Understand points to intelligent technological understanding, placing very different works in reference to industrialism and materialism. The works show how the participating artists, each in their own way, transform something cold and industrial into something tactile and sensory.

The exhibition is organised in collaboration with Kristian Touborg.

Photo credits: Jan Søndergaard