"Nordic Mixed Media" - curated by Elfi von Kantzow Alvin
On view January 28 through March 7, 2010

Daniel Sandberg (Sweden) - Photography
Matthias van Arkel (Sweden) - Platinum Silicone-rubber
Torild Stray (Norway) - Oil on canvas

The American Scandinavian Society and the Trygve Lie Gallery proudly present the Exhibition "Nordic Mixed Media", curated by Elfi von Kantzow Alvin.

“Selecting artists through the years for these exhibitions has been both challenging and enormously rewarding. The three artists we present –in this our 72nd exhibition– could not be more dissimilar nor offer more vastly different expression in their work.

Swedish artist, Matthias van Arkel, gives us strong abstract expression with industrial material – which includes an admixture of platinum. Swedish photographer, Daniel Sandberg, relates with spare, stark realism. Norwegian painter, Torild Stray, whom we include for the second time, touches us with lush, sensual, figurative symbolism.”
- Elfi von Kantzow Alvin, Art Committee Chair, American Scandinavian Society.

Opening Reception, Thursday, January 28th, 6-8 pm
You are cordially invited to attend the Opening Reception, Thursday, January 28,
from 6 to 8 p.m., at the gallery.

Read about the Exhibition in the media
Nordstjernan - the Swedish newspaper in the US

About the artists

DANIEL SANDBERG
Stockholm-based artist Daniel Sandberg’s work explores the relationship and growing imbalance between nature and man. His large-scale photographs, usually taken from a distant perspective always depict landscapes where man’s presence is either a seen or unseen participant. The work is dramatic and aesthetically pleasing and brings to mind Andreas Gursky photographs.

In this, his first exhibition in NYC, Daniel presents several pieces from the nearby Hamptons. They are a part of his ongoing Beach Series; which examines mans relationship to and use of this particular landscape.

Sandberg has previously exhibited in Europe, at Epson Kunst Betrieb, Market Art Fair Stockholm 2009, Galleri Mårtenson & Persson Påarp to name only a few, as well as having been selected for the Liljevalchs-Vårsalong Stockholm 2009. In newspapers and magazines, as he has received increasing exposure, the focus has been on his incisive view of changing landscapes.

MATTHIAS VAN ARKEL
Stockholm-born artist, Matthias van Arkel, “paints” colorful three dimensional abstractions using the strongest industrial rubber and pigments. The process is part random abstract expressionist and part tightly controlled minimalist sculpture.

Van Arkel presses pigments into the rubber, twisting, compressing, layering and sculpting, then he cuts and forms this in a metal tray to “bake”.

“Van Arkel’s engagement with his materials yields stratified composites of form, texture and color recalling forms that might be associated with landscapes, tectonic plates, or on another more intimate level, remnants of erotic encounters perhaps.” The critic Stephen Conway, NYC, 2008

Van Arkel is well known and collected in Scandinavia, with over a dozen solo and some fifteen group exhibitions, His next show opens at Gallery Aronowitsch, Stockholm in March.

He will also exhibit giclee prints bringing the three dimensions back to two.

TORILD STRAY
Norwegian-born Torild Stray has been based in New York City since 1990. Her work has been exhibited in the United States and Europe for over a decade. Stray's work is collected internationally and has received critical acclaim.

Since coming to NY, Stray has been the recipient of many awards and scholarships, including the Agnus Gund Scholarship, the New York Times Scholarship, the Charles Revson Fellowship and the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council Artist in Residency Program in WTC.

Stray teaches at the NY Studio School of Drawing, Painting and Sculpture and the Bryggen Kunstskole in Bergen, Norway. Stray's next one-person show opens at Gallery Langegaarden, Bergen, Norway September 11th, 2010.

EXHIBITION DETAILS
Where: Trygve Lie Gallery, The Norwegian Church at 317 East 52nd Street, New York (between 1st and 2nd Avenues)
When: Exhibition on view January 28th through March 7, 2010.
Info: Call (212) 319-0370
Opening hours: Monday – Thurs: 12-6pm, Friday - Sun: 1-5pm.
Subway: 6, E or V to 51st/53rd St. & Lexington Ave.

Admission is free, and the exhibit is open to the public.