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Per Kirkeby, who passed away in his Danish hometown of Copenhagen in 2018, is considered the most internationally recognized Danish artist of his generation and one of the most important European contemporary artists. Since making his debut in the early 1960s, he had developed his motifs – or, in his own words, “structures” – which form the primary substance of his painting. With a background in geology, Kirkeby repeatedly drew inspiration from the rich landscape of his Danish homeland. In continuation of a Northern European landscape art tradition rooted in the work of, among others, Caspar David Friedrich, he evolved an intuitive, improvisational pictorial language that occupies the sublime realm between figuration and abstraction. With its organic flow of color, texture, and form, the present work is less a representation of a specific place than a sensual homage to nature's magic and mysteries. Kirkeby explains: “There is a hidden reality, and it is the real reality [..] We only see it in glimpses. A painter can sometimes see it [..], and if I paint at all, it is only because I have those glimpses.” (Per Kirkeby, quoted from: Per Kirkeby, Brussels, ex. cat. Galerie Phillipe Guimot, Bruxelles, 1991, p. 64).
In large formats and with a rich palette, Kirkeby uses his signature visual language to create sensual motifs reminiscent of American Color Field Painting and Abstract Expressionism, bringing the idea of landscape as a sedimented to the canvas with great skill. Kirkeby sees nature in a cross-section rather than in space; the surface gains structure between transparency and density, from the muted and blurred brushstrokes in the background to the powerful gestures in the foreground. The work is executed in an autumn palette with dramatic and expressive colors. In a lengthy work process, many layers of paint are applied, only some of which remain visible in the resulting work. The motif appears hidden, emerging only in traces, yet it cannot be immediately deciphered. As such, Kirkeby's paintings can be seen as geological studies of the substance of art, addressing art and nature as parallel phenomena.
Kirkeby explains: “Geology is the study of the forces behind the forms, both the constructive and the destructive. And that entails a lot of assumptions [..] Because none of these forces can be observed. Small forces can be observed right up to earthquakes; we assume they are models. However, it is still an assumption that the gigantic forces to which the landscapes bear witness are a multiplication of the assumed models in terms of magnitude and time. Life is short.” (Per Kirkeby, quoted from: “La Città di Riga” in: ibid., Bravura. Ausgewählte Essays aus Bravura und Naturens blyant, Verlag Gachnang & Springer, Bern – Berlin, 1984, pp. 154-155).
Today, Kirkeby's impressive oeuvre of paintings is part of significant collections like the Museum of Modern Art, New York, Tate Modern, London, the Centre Pompidou, Paris, the Statens Museum for Kunst, Copenhagen, and the Pinakothek der Moderne, Munich. [KA]