De Blide

In the exhibition De Blide at Kunstforeningen Vordingborg, a variety of artistic expressions are presented through works that, in one way or another, relate to the fragmented. Created by five emerging visual artists, these works form the artist collective De Blide, each shaped by individual approaches, materials, and media such as textile, painting, photography, and sculpture.

The group emerged in 2021 during the COVID-19 pandemic, a time when these budding artists came together amidst challenging circumstances. Despite later pursuing education at different institutions, including Goldsmiths in London, Hochschule für Grafik und Buchkunst in Leipzig, Konsthögskolan in Malmö, The Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts in Copenhagen, and The Funen Art Academy, they have succeeded in maintaining and developing their collaboration. In 2022, art historian Helle Fagralid joined the group.

The exhibition De Blide, which marks the collective’s first official exhibition, can be seen as a counterbalance to the digitalization and rapidly shifting perspectives that characterize our time. The artists have all chosen to work with traditional art historical crafts, where process, tactility, and material play essential roles in the creation of artistic expression. These are classical media that reach back in time, yet here they are rooted in the present, offering a reflection on how we relate to time itself.

In Emil Kjerrman’s reliefs, fragments of antique motifs crafted in scagliola, the contrast between the porous plaster and the imitated, solid marble becomes apparent in a technique popular in the 17th century. Signe Maria Friis’ large-scale hand-embroidered textile work, composed of 24 panels, becomes a free-floating visualization of the ever-shifting movements of the wind. In Jens Alfred Raahauge’s oil paintings, based on old family photographs, the past is revisited through imagery that appears as frozen fragments of time. Rigmor Fischer combines oil, pastel, ink, and graphite on canvas, giving her visual world the character of the dream's illogical fragments. And in a monumental three-part photographic series, Ditte Johanne Krogh Bertelsen uses risograph prints, which, like puzzle pieces, emphasize the fragility and esoteric nature of the motif.

We hope you will take the time to immerse yourself in the exhibition and perhaps discover connections between the different works. Maybe reflect on time itself and how we all, in some way, try to capture or hold on to the fleeting fragments that make it up.

- Curator Helle Fagralid and De Blide

The exhibition is curated by Helle Fagralid and organized by Kunstforeningen Vordingborg in collaboration with Vordingborg Libraries. Sincere thanks for financial support to Grosserer L. F. Foghts Fond, Vordingborg Municipality, DGI Huset, and HD-Glas Glarmesteren i Algade.

Installation photos: Mikkel Kaldal