weightlessness
ed. art now lauches the latest collaboration– with artist Anneè Olofsson.
The print, bearing the intriguing title Mourning hours of mirage nights of mist captures a state of weightlessness. A woman lies in the water with her face above the surface, but the camera– and thus the viewer–is beneath the woman, surrounded by water. "I wanted to try to get to the feeling you have when you are mourning," says Anneè Olofsson, "the feeling of being in a vacuum of grief, not knowing where you are, just that you are so close to sinking. But you still choose life.”
Olofsson started working on this peice in connection with her father's passing away. In her father's old record collection, she then found Bill Evans' and Jim Hall's LP "Undercurrent", adorned by a picture of a floating woman. It struck her that the model wore a dress almost identical to the artist's own wedding gown; a dress she has used many times in her own artistry, in pictures where her father also figured. In addition, she was struck by the state that the floating woman was in. It seemed to have something in common with her own state of mourning. Olofsson found the original image behind the record cover, taken by fashion photographer Toni Frissell, and decided to continue working with the image, in her own adaptation, as a way to process her grief. On Olofsson's picture, we see the artist weightlessly floating, wearing her own wedding gown.
In 2014, when Anneè Olofsson showed the large format C-print Mourning from the same series of images, at Market art fair, it was acclaimed by critics. Mourning hours of mirage nights of mist is based on an analogue negative that has been digitized, transferred to plate and printed by Jenny Olsson, intaglio print teacher at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Stockholm. Details in the print are hand-coloured.
Anneè Olofsson works with photography, video, sculpture and installation, but she is most famous for her photographic works. In simple, powerful images she portrays states and feelings, often with herself as a model. The pictures bear a simple beauty that appeals, but beneath the surface lingers a hidden discomfort. Darkness is unmistakeable, both figuratively and factually. Aging and sadness are recurring themes, but are not always conveyed without hope.
Olofsson is often mentioned as one of Sweden's leading artists working with the photographic medium. She is educated atthe Oslo National Academy of the Arts, with a degree in 1997. She has since been exhibited around the world. In 2011, Kulturhuset in Stockholm presented a large exhibition with her works. She is one of few Swedish artists represented with works in the collection of the Museum of Modern Art in New York.
