Image Gallery
Illustration by Lydia Ortiz
Scenes from Western Culture installation view. Photo: Henrik Kam
Scenes from Western Culture installation view. Photo: Henrik Kam
Ragnar Kjartansson, Scenes from Western Culture, Dog and Clock, 2015 © Ragnar Kjartansson; Courtesy of the artist, Luhring Augustine, New York and i8 Gallery, Reykjavik
Ragnar Kjartansson, Scenes from Western Culture, Burning House, 2015 © Ragnar Kjartansson; Courtesy of the artist, Luhring Augustine, New York and i8 Gallery, Reykjavik
Ragnar Kjartansson, Scenes from Western Culture, Dinner (Jason Moran and Alicia Hall Moran), 2015 © Ragnar Kjartansson; Courtesy of the artist, Luhring Augustine, New York and i8 Gallery, Reykjavik
Ragnar Kjartansson, Scenes from Western Culture, Gentleman (Kjartan Sveinsson), 2015 © Ragnar Kjartansson; Courtesy of the artist, Luhring Augustine, New York and i8 Gallery, Reykjavik
Scenes from Western Culture installation view. Photo: Henrik Kam
Ragnar Kjartansson, Scenes from Western Culture, Rich German Children (Ingibjörg Sigurjónsdóttir), 2015 © Ragnar Kjartansson; Courtesy of the artist, Luhring Augustine, New York and i8 Gallery, Reykjavik
Ragnar Kjartansson, Scenes from Western Culture, Guitar Lesson (Ólafía Hrönn Jónsdóttir, Logi Pedro Stefánsson), 2015 © Ragnar Kjartansson; Courtesy of the artist, Luhring Augustine, New York and i8 Gallery, Reykjavik
Ragnar Kjartansson, Scenes from Western Culture, The Pool (Elizabeth Peyton), 2015 © Ragnar Kjartansson; Courtesy of the artist, Luhring Augustine, New York and i8 Gallery, Reykjavik
Scenes from Western Culture installation view. Photo: Henrik Kam
Jean-Antoine Watteau, The Fortune Teller, ca. 1710. © Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, Roscoe and Margaret Oakes Collection, 68.4
Scenes from Western Culture installation view. Photo: Henrik Kam
Scenes from Western Culture installation view. Photo: Henrik Kam
Scenes from Western Culture (2015) is a nine-screen installation of looping videos, each depicting a faintly absurd and occasionally ominous vision of Western daily life. Drawing inspiration from Jean-Antoine Watteau’s pastoral scenes of 18th-century aristocrats enjoying their leisure, Kjartansson crafts intimate moments of modern-day characters lost in a similar frivolity. The exhibition juxtaposes Kjartansson’s work with Watteau’s painting The Fortune Teller (ca. 1710), on loan from the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco.
Kjartansson’s Nur wer die Sehnsucht kennt (2015) comprises numerous free-standing painted structures of snowy crags. The exposed plywood backs and supporting struts on the reverse side of each form reveals their theatrical function. Translated as “only he who knows longing” from a poem by Goethe, Nur wer die Sehnsucht kennt champions the sublime and the mundane as one. The two installations are complemented by a selection of the artist’s preparatory watercolor sketches.
ABOUT THE ARTIST
Ragnar Kjartansson (b. 1976) is an Icelandic artist whose work in video installations, performances, drawings, and paintings play on the history of film, music, visual culture, and literature. His pieces are connected through humor and pathos, with each deeply influenced by the comedy and tragedy of classical theater. Kjartansson’s use of duration and repetition to harness collective emotion is a hallmark of his practice.