FERDINAND AHM KRAG
’TURBULENT INFINITY’
August 9th – September 8th, 2007
Opening reception, Thursday August 8th, 17-20
Afterparty at ‘Venners Hjem’ with food, beer and a nice atmosphere
DJ: Master Fatman
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
This is Ferdinand Ahm Krag’s first solo exhibition at bendixen contemporary art. The show is titled “Turbulent Infinity” and will present a number of drawings.
In his formalistic drawings Ahm Krag combines various spaces. Landscapes and architectonic or even musical spaces arise from his expansive compositions. The notion of scale is variable and indefinable. We find ourselves asking the question: is this a macroscopic or microscopic world?
The symmetrical composition of these drawings gives quite a few of them an approximate resemblance to masks. Floating and abstract face-like shapes seem to be charged with waves of energy and musical vibrations. Or are we witnessing the splitting of atoms? Or perhaps science fiction architecture from another planet?
In his art, Ahm Krag endeavours to capture motifs and figurations in an abstract, indefinable state of ”translation”. The pictorial space stretches infinitely in all directions, while at the same time pulsating between inner and outer, micro and macro, architecture and music, face and landscape. Occasionally the works display a great formal complexity, but Ahm Krag’s drawings originate in quite basic technique. They simply consist of lines drawn with a ball-point pen and a ruler across printing paper. They may resemble works by Sol LeWitt or Agnes Martin, but only at first glance. For Ahm Krag clearly draws upon numerous sources such as constructivism, futurism, psychedelic art, op-art, science-fiction, textile design and computer-generated visualisations of sound. Ahm Krag has articulated the following about his method of drawing: “These are meditative repetitions of the straight line, of the horizon line. One line under another, under yet a third and fourth line, et cetera. Until the entire piece of paper is covered in straight lines, and nothing but straight lines. The world represented as an accumulation of straight lines. And yet this world is far from perfect, for the lines are not quite straight. The surface reveals little discrepancies and smudged displacements. Chance coincidences. These coincidences are crucial, for they fill the space with possibility. Possibility is energy, and – if they may be said to represent anything – the drawings represent how spatial energies are captured by the psychic apparatus and wrapped up in patterns. A drawing is a device for perception.”
Ferdinand Ahm Krag graduated from The Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts in 2006. He has been nominated for the Carnegie Art Award 2008 and contributes frequently to the daily newspaper Information as an art critic.
Opening hours: Tuesday – Friday 12-17, Saturday 11-14
bendixen contemporary art
Carl Jacobsens Vej 20, 4th Floor
DK-2500 Valby
+45 36 16 03 25