JONAS MALMBERG (FÖDD 1987). Untitled.

Oil on linen canvas, 40 x 30,5 cm. Signed and dated Jonas Malmberg 2021.

PROVENANCE
Thomas Wallner Gallery

In the painting “Untitled” we see a portrait of a cougar painted in a dull color scale. The work is a typical example of Jonas Malmberg's personal pictorial world, where nature often appears as something equally familiar and alien. In Malmberg's painting, the collage is the starting point for his creative process. There, in dreamlike chains of association, he mixes art historical models from the Northern European Renaissance with images of exotic animals drawn from mass media channels. Seriousness and sadness are combined with quiet humor in a visual world that allows reality to be alienated in a multifaceted flow of anachronisms. These anachronisms remind the viewer that the world we live in and our experience of it are not always congruent. Our experience of reality, and in Malmberg's work especially nature, is changed and influenced by the flow of photographs, nature documentaries and travels we take part in. Our experience is also influenced by our tradition of attributing human characteristics to animals. The image of the lone wolf, the brave lion and the bird on a branch as a symbol of freedom is inserted into our interpretation. In Jonas Malmberg's paintings all its impressions are woven together, creating a new, dreamlike logic.

Jonas Malmberg holds a degree from the School of Fine Arts at Umeå University. He has also studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Bergen and the Royal Academy in Copenhagen. Jonas Malmberg has several exhibitions behind him, including at Galleri Ping-Pong, Malmö and Galleri Thomas Wallner, Simris. In 2018, he received the Fredrik Roos Scholarship.