Danish Contemporary Art up for Auction

Allan Otte, Cathrine Raben Davidsen and Trine Søndergaard – Danish contemporary art is gaining ground on the international market these years. When Bruun Rasmussen holds the year's first Live Auction of modern art and Scandinavian design, it will include a large number of works by some of the most significant Danish artists at the moment.

An Understated Depiction of Denmark

One of the Danish contemporary artists who has made a significant mark on the contemporary art scene in Denmark is Allan Otte. In the work "Kødet blev jord” (And the Meat Turned to Soil) from 2010, he depicts a cemetery with an open landscape in the background. At a first glance, the motif seems photorealistic, but a closer look reveals the brush strokes more clearly, almost like pixels on a screen. It allows the work to balance between a type of documentation and a dreamlike universe, emphasized by the artist's shifting use of sharpness and blurriness. The motif is empty of people, but the landscape shows a clear presence of civilization in the form of wind turbines, buildings and the sharp division of the fields. The title has an almost grotesque feel to it and refers to the process of decay that occurs with the buried body. Through its many facets, this understated depiction of Denmark creates a great many reflections in the viewer’s mind.

On the Border Between the Said and the Unsaid

Cathrine Raben Davidsen belongs to the same generation of artists. She works within a broad spectrum – from paintings and drawings to ceramics and costume design, and her work has been displayed on a wide number of international exhibitions in places such as London and New York. Her universe has been called feminine, poetic and dreamlike, but beneath the surface lurks themes of loss, deprivation and death. Her classical schooling from art academies in Copenhagen and Florence cannot be denied, and the female figure often occupies a central role in her work. Included in the auction is her large painting entitled “Returning of the Favor”(2005), which depicts three young women posing as models in a fashion magazine – one of the artist's sources of inspiration. The background is kept in turquoise – a colour that is common to Raben Davidsen and which she herself refers to as a "meditation colour" that lies on the border between the said and the unsaid. There always seems to be something enigmatic and unspoken at stake in her work.

A Reference to Hammershøi

The art of Wilhelm Hammershøi appears to be a clear inspiration for the photographic artist Trine Søndergaard's work "Guldnakke" (Gold Neck) from 2012. Both the pose, colour and choice of motif as well as the mood and sense of melancholy and absence are clear references to Hammershøi's portraits of women with their back turned. And like Hammershøi, Søndergaard is concerned with not letting the portrayed reveal too much. The special combination of the gold-embroidered traditional 19th-century headgear contrasted with the young woman's modern clothing and beautiful bare neck creates an alluring tension and mystique that neutralizes time and space in the image. The documentary feel that is so characteristic of the photographic medium is erased. Instead, the work opens up as a symbolic interior image rather than a documentation of an outer reality – just as in the paintings of Hammershøi.

Auction: 5-7 March at Bredgade 33 in Copenhagen.

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