Asger JornWithout Boundaries

In his colour-saturated paintings the Danish painter and writer Asger Jorn (1914–1973) creates dynamic pictorial worlds that testify in part to a humorous and playful lightness, in part to an apocalyptic melancholy. Driven by his great interest in the Scandinavian tradition, an interest that had arisen not least in reaction to the adversities of the times, Asger Jorn painted and wrote tirelessly, while also creating an extensive body of ceramic work. His visual works are couched in an extraordinarily powerful pictorial language that oscillates between abstraction and figuration. Throughout his career Asger Jorn maintained contact with numerous fellow artists; he was a founding member both of the CoBrA group and, later, of the Situationist International. The substantial book accompanying the exhibition offers a concentrated selection of some 60 works, with an emphasis on the period between the 1930s and the 1970s. Major works such as „Sans bornes“ of 1959/60 and „Im Anfang war das Bild“ of 1965/66 are presented and discussed in detail. Just how broad the range of media in this œuvre is becomes apparent in key themes and motifs which, taken up again and again by the artist, run through his entire artistic practice. The works exhibited in Hamburg and presented in the book are eloquent testimony to the intensity and enduring topicality of his art and unquestionably belong to the canon of twentieth-century art.

Exhibition:
Deichtorhallen Hamburg, 22/6 – 23/9/2018