HERTHA HANSON
15 MAY – 13 JUNE 2021
"Hertha Hanson’s painting comes to me as both sensory and corporeal memories. The vertical surfaces of paint move within the frame of the canvas. My own movement, both physical and mental, becomes part of the process. A shift in my gaze or body movement changes the event radically. Both the painting’s material constitution and energy, as well as my own associations and thoughts, affect how the colour surfaces are activated, and in which sequence.
I come to think of Roland Barthes’s Mourning Dairy (2010) entry of 10 November: “Struck by the abstract nature of absence; yet it’s so painful, lacerating. Which allows me to understand abstraction better: it is absence and pain, the pain of absence – perhaps therefore love?
In Japanese archery, the shooter hits the bullseye within themselves before the arrow is set in motion. I imagine that the performative aspect of Hanson’s painting functions in a similar way. Only once a colour is formulated does she interact with the canvas. Whereas Mark Rothko’s surfaces feel like they have emerged, rubbed out by soft brushes from the depths of the canvas, Hanson applies the paint with the relentless pressure of the spreader’s sharp metal blades. Firmly, she attaches the paint to the elastic textile of the canvas.”
Birgitta Burling about Hertha Hanson in Kunstkritikk.
HERTHA HANSON is born 1980 in Lund. She currently lives and works in Karlstad. She received her Master of Fine Arts from Malmö Art Academy.
Hertha Hanson’s works has been shown at Lidköping Konsthall, Kristinehamns konstmuseum, Malmö Konstmuseum, Lunds konsthall, Luleå Konsthall, Rackstadmuseet Arvika, Arnstedt Östra Karup, etc.
Hertha Hanson has received numerous awards such as Eric and Inger Olson-Ekdahl Grant, Edstrandska foundation, Ellen Trotzig Grant, Fredrik Roos Grant, Bror Hjorth drawing Grant, etc.
Hertha Hanson’s works is represented in public collections such as Malmö Konstmuseum, Kristinehamns konstmuseum, Gotlands Museum, Stockholm Konst, Statens konstråd, Bror Hjorths Hus, etc.
She has worked with public commissions for Region Stockholm and Region Värmland, etc.
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