Exhibition | Martin Bodilsen Kaldahl “Possible Gestures” at Gelleri Format Oslo

The contemporary ceramic art of Mar­tin Bod­ilsen Kaldahl at Galleri Format Oslo all em­pha­size their fun­da­men­tal ex­is­tence in space. The exhibition, Possible Gestures runs through January 21 – February 28 in Oslo. Through his pre­cise for­mal elab­o­ra­tion of the ma­te­r­ial, even a ca­sual and ba­nal ges­ture in space is at­trib­uted sig­nif­i­cance. With a vig­i­lant eye for the mon­u­men­tal within the in­signif­i­cant, the artist him­self works to cre­ate the con­di­tions for shap­ing an in­tu­itive, spa­tial form. He works from an over­all vision, while at the same time mak­ing ob­sta­cles for him­self in or­der to lose some of his con­trol. Out of nu­mer­ous pieces of cut clay ­tubes, the artist builds parts that are later as­sem­bled into larger struc­tures, that rise and fall, ran­domly danc­ing and grop­ing their way through space. The sculp­tural state­ments might be emerg­ing out of a men­tal void. They ex­ist, but they could just as eas­ily have looked com­pletely dif­fer­ent. They are re­sults of a dis­tracted sense and thus re­main pure sculp­tural move­ments – like a cap­tured account of the mo­ment.

For the ex­hi­bi­tion at Gallery For­mat, Kaldahl has made works of a larger scale than be­fore. The works have all been made dur­ing an artist’s res­i­dency in the ce­ram­ics de­part­ment at KhiO, Oslo Na­tional Acad­emy of the Arts in the au­tumn of 2015. The works are in­ter­pre­ta­tions of ba­sic el­e­ments in vi­sual im­agery, e.g. the line as sculp­ture or the sphere as a three di­men­sional ref­er­ence to the point. The en­closed ring is the piv­otal point of sev­eral works; in a sim­ple shape placed di­rectly on the floor or as sculp­tural stackings. The artist equally ex­ploits as­pects re­lated to the tex­tural and color po­ten­tial of ce­ram­ics it­self.

Through­out his ca­reer Mar­tin Bod­ilsen Kaldahl has worked with var­i­ous for­mal ex­pres­sions in clay. One re­turn­ing theme has been the knot as a spa­tial fig­ure. He has made se­ries of works, where nat­ural form and cul­tural con­struc­tion are jux­ta­posed – one reflect­ing the other. His in­ter­est lies in the po­ten­tial of the form to make a di­rect emo­tional im­pact on the viewer. The mo­tif is always clear in its sim­plic­ity – you see what you see – but the work equally dis­plays a time-di­men­sion, that un­der­lines the ba­nal start­ing point and in­scribes the work into a tra­di­tion, where the pre­cise elab­o­ra­tion is a self-evi­dent pre­con­di­tion.

Martin Bodilsen Kaldahl (born 1954) lives and works in Copenhagen. He was educated at the Royal College of Art in London (MA, 1990). His works are represented in several public and private collections, e.g. the Victoria & Albert Museum, London; Musée d’Art Decoratifs, Paris; Kunstindustrimuseet, Oslo; Röhsska Museum, Gothenburg; Designmuseum Danmark, Copenhagen; Trapholt Art Museum, DK; CLAY/Grimmerhus, Museum of International Ceramic Art, DK; MIMA, Middlesborough, UK; Diane and Marc Grainer Collection, Washington DC; Annie and Otto Johs. Detlefs’ Foundation, DK; Aller Media, DK. Recent exhibitions include: Random Growth, PHOs Art and Design, London, 2015/16; NeC Gallery, Paris, 2014 (solo); X-Scapes, Copenhagen Ceramics, 2014 (with Marit Tingleff); The Ceramic Object, Gallery Format, Oslo, 2014; Danish Design at the House, Sydney Opera House, 2013; Other Objects, Copenhagen Ceramics, 2012 (solo); PULS Contemporary Ceramics, Brussels, 2011 (solo); Contemporary British Studio Ceramics, Mint Museum, North Carolina, US, 2010; Mindcraft 09, Milan 2009; The Digital Clay, Designmuseum Denmark, 2008; END – Engelsk-Norwegian-Danish group exhibition, Designmuseum Danmark, 2007. Martin Bodilsen Kaldahl is a part-time teacher at SuperFormLab at KADK, The Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts, Schools of Architecture, Design and Conservation. He was a co-initiator of the exhibition platform, Copenhagen Ceramics in 2011.

Text (edited) and photographs courtesy of the gallery.

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