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Swedish conceptual artist Cecilia Edefalk opened her first solo exhibit in the United States this month with a series of paintings that examines the elusiveness of memory through the repeated image of a statue of Venus in a garden.
The central piece is a tiny rendition of a photograph Edefalk took of the statue in 1999, with a massive projection of the painting superimposed in a darkened room.
The remaining 11 canvases are varied in scale and in the way the sculpture is represented.
The artist restricts herself to spectral tones of white, blue and grey and the works -- which she developed painstakingly over the course of seven years -- become gradually lighter, larger and more abstract.
"For me, up until now, it has been a way to understand life," Edefalk told a crowd of about 100 people gathered at the Art Institute of Chicago. "This is why I've been quite slow because I am learning as I do my work... it's about exploring things I'm interested in."
Edefalk has long experimented with repetition in her work, moving from a series of self-portraits to pornographic images which allowed her to explore Buddhism to a popular series portraying comedic legends Laurel and Hardy in which she explored how couples can become two sides of the same person.
"When you repeat your brushstrokes you are able to look at how they are done," she said. "In a way you can analyze your brushstrokes. That in a way is a kind of abstraction."
Edefalk's unique approach to examining the relationships between painting, photography and sculpture and her attention to the creation of an installation rather than individual works makes her a remarkable conceptual artist, said James Rondeau, curator of contemporary art for the Art Institute.
"For the last half century we've been obsessed with the dialogue between painting and photo," he said. "Cecilia is navigating that dialogue in a unique way and it becomes a work of art that really leaves the painting behind."
Rondeau expressed dismay that Edefalk, who has been shown in some of the world's most prestigious exhibitions, is virtually unknown in the United States.
He contacted Edefalk several years ago to discuss bringing her work to Chicago and visited her several times in her studio as she developed the installation.
It was well-received on opening night.
"They're very experimental," said Jason Loebes, 23, who is obtaining a master's degree in fine arts at the Art Institute. "Just approach them -- they look as if they were painted in a sitting but they have certain detail that reveals itself after a time... the paint sits in the canvas very well."
Edefalk, who has exhibited extensively in Europe, including at the Swiss gallery of Kunsthalle Bern and the Musee d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, said she was thrilled to have a solo show in the United States.
"It's a kind of freedom," she told AFP. "It's an opening -- I have access to new ways of thinking and it gives me new forms of input."
Edefalk's Venus series will be on display at the Art Institute of Chicago through April 23.
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AFP 101305 GMT 02 06
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