Trash Art
”From Modernism to Postmodernism - Swedish art 1900-2000”, Publisher Signum
By Folke Edwards
Kent Karlsson (born 1946) who studied in Valand art school in Gothenburg during the latter part of the 1970s established himself first as a abstract puristic painter with clean diagonal fields in American grand scale – as investigations into the color’s room creational possibilities. During the latter part of the 1980’s he started instead to work with three-dimensional formation and installations. The clear and vital optimism in the early paintings moves towards an all the more deeper decline and his work is imprinted by destruction, death drive and corruption: charred motorbikes, burnt-out drum sets, and decaying altar screens with rotting fish as a reminder of Christ’s suffering. All life seems to have fled and if there is any it has the character of monstrosities, deformation or gene manipulation. Like a postmodern Samuel Beckett. But Kent Karlssons work exhibits a delirious breakdown of civilization – which can turn most of postmodern art into happy art – but also a macabre and frightening beauty. In the same way as Roj Friberg. But with the difference that the human being in Fribergs work is central, whereas Kent Karlsson she is absent – we only get to see the leftovers from the devastation she creates. And when she sometimes shows up it is in the shape as an inhumane hybrid – in a world that has lost all its illusions. Karlssons “Trash art” has other dimensions as the ones found in Mike Kellys or Paul McCarthys works. With Kent Karlsson it is not a matter of rubbish – or stimulating chaos, but rather catastrophes and annihilation.
”From Modernism to Postmodernism - Swedish art 1900-2000”, Publisher Signum
By Folke Edwards
Kent Karlsson (born 1946) who studied in Valand art school in Gothenburg during the latter part of the 1970s established himself first as a abstract puristic painter with clean diagonal fields in American grand scale – as investigations into the color’s room creational possibilities. During the latter part of the 1980’s he started instead to work with three-dimensional formation and installations. The clear and vital optimism in the early paintings moves towards an all the more deeper decline and his work is imprinted by destruction, death drive and corruption: charred motorbikes, burnt-out drum sets, and decaying altar screens with rotting fish as a reminder of Christ’s suffering. All life seems to have fled and if there is any it has the character of monstrosities, deformation or gene manipulation. Like a postmodern Samuel Beckett. But Kent Karlssons work exhibits a delirious breakdown of civilization – which can turn most of postmodern art into happy art – but also a macabre and frightening beauty. In the same way as Roj Friberg. But with the difference that the human being in Fribergs work is central, whereas Kent Karlsson she is absent – we only get to see the leftovers from the devastation she creates. And when she sometimes shows up it is in the shape as an inhumane hybrid – in a world that has lost all its illusions. Karlssons “Trash art” has other dimensions as the ones found in Mike Kellys or Paul McCarthys works. With Kent Karlsson it is not a matter of rubbish – or stimulating chaos, but rather catastrophes and annihilation.
title: Fata Morgana
medium: drum kit, flocked synthetic fibers
year: 1988
medium: drum kit, flocked synthetic fibers
year: 1988
title: Atlantis
medium: mixed media
size: 410 x 310 x 60 cm.
year: 1991
medium: mixed media
size: 410 x 310 x 60 cm.
year: 1991
title: Absolute knowledge / The essence of freedom I
medium: mixed media
year: 1990
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medium: mixed media
year: 1990