Scan Magazine | Special Theme | Scandinavian Culture – Sweden
´ Shoes for Departure (1991), Left: Julia Peirone’s Sleepy head (2016) is shown in the context of Before and Behind the Lens. Photo: Julia Peirone. Middle: Marina Abramovic, as seen in The Cleaner. Photo: Heini Schneebeli, courtesy of the Marina Abramovic´ Archives. Right: Marina Abramovic´ at the Eric Ericson Hall. Photo: Moderna Museet / Åsa Lundén. Bottom: From the exhibition Malmö’s Burning at Moderna Museet in Malmö. Photo: Lars Hejll
The Cleaner comes to Stockholm Yugoslavia-born Marina Abramovic´ is one of the world’s most discussed performance artists. This spring, she comes to Moderna Museet with her new exhibition The Cleaner. By Malin Norman
Marina Abramovic´ is famous for groundbreaking performances and for expanding the boundaries of art. Her famous exhibition The Artist is Present at the Museum of Modern Art in New York attracted some 750,000 visitors who queued to sit in a chair opposite her. This spring, her new exhibition The Cleaner is showing at Moderna Museet in Stockholm. It is Abramovic’s ´ first major retrospective in Europe, looking back some 40 years and including works with artist Ulay (Uwe Laysiepen) as well as shows by other performance artists. “The real performances are a bit like mindfulness but more extreme,” says the museum’s communication strategist John Peter Nilsson. “Abramovic’s ´ art is about exposing the body to physical strains in order for the senses to be liberated.” The Cleaner is open at Moderna Museet until 21 May. Re-performances will take place 52 | Issue 98 | March 2017
daily and the audience will be very much part of the exhibition.
Leader in modern art Moderna Museet is one of Europe’s leading museums of modern and contemporary art. It has an impressive programme and offers guided tours in several languages. “We work a lot on how to make it even more interesting and enhance the experience for our visitors,” says Nilsson about how the museum is extending its availability to attract a new audience. “Art is a bit like theatre – it’s important to see it together with others, but people can decide for themselves how long they want to look at each painting.” Worth checking out is the museum’s extensive photography collection, which comprises around 100,000 works from the 1840s and up to this day. Several exhibitions will take place this spring with a
focus on photography under the banner Before and Behind the Lens, including a new display on the technical development of photography and how it has been used in art, opening this month. Moderna Museet is also present in Malmö, where a new display of the work of one of Sweden’s most internationally acclaimed artists, Annika Eriksson, opened this month. Another highlight is Malmö’s Burning, with selected works from the art scene in Malmö from the 1960s through to the ‘80s.
For more information, please visit: www.modernamuseet.se