Ditte Ejlerskov
Ditte Ejlerskov
The Echo of the Storm - a discovery of the sea goddess Rán
In the exhibition ‘The Echo of the Storm’, contemporary artist Ditte Ejlerskov dives into the emotions that arise during and after a storm or an intense experience. These are feelings that the artist knows from her own life – including, from her childhood in Vendsyssel, where the mighty and at times dangerous forces of the sea are a basic condition.
Spurred on by her experiences and memories of the sea, Ditte Ejlerskov has created a number of new works with the Norse sea goddess Rán as the focal point. Rán is not one of the most well-known figures in Norse mythology nowadays but nevertheless played an important role as the goddess of the deep sea. With her powers, she created storms and waves and led drowned sailors to her realm at the bottom of the sea.
In the exhibition, Ditte Ejlerskov unfolds the story of Rán through painting, tapestries, printmaking, video, Augmented Reality and not least through a bronze sculpture in which Rán, with her body, forms an inverted arc – a pose that many will know from gymnastics or yoga. Historically, however, it has also been linked to notions of female hysteria and witchcraft. In Ejlerskov’s work, Rán thus becomes an image of nature’s opposites between creation and destruction, wildness and tranquillity.
In the side gallery on the 1st floor, Ditte Ejlerskov has created a meditation room where Rán and her nine daughters invite you down into the depths of the sea in a video work, where you can seek the silence after the storm.
The exhibition also includes a series of artworks, called ‘The Wrestlers’, a reinterpretation of the classic Roman sculpture of the same name, in which women replace the two wrestling men. The works reflect the feeling of having conflicting emotions simultaneously, which we all experience now and then. The same conflicted experience is the basis for Ditte Ejlerskov’s paintings, where two very different colours meet in the middle and merge into new, indefinable, sensuous surfaces.
Both ‘Rán’ and ‘The Wrestlers’ can be experienced through Augmented Reality, which, via QR codes, can be taken home and unleashed anywhere.
The exhibition and publication are supported by: 15. Juni Fonden, Augustinus Fonden, Ny Carlsbergfondet and The Danish Arts Foundation as well as Martin Asbæk Gallery and Dansk Wilton.
