lets just go directly to the questions.
what kind of art are you doing and what material/media do you use to create your art?
The art I make is what I feel like right now. I am not captured by any particular medium. right now I’m very free. I’m still in a great development since I am still a young artist. For a long time the solid media, ex. paper and pencil, was what I enjoyed the most because of the accessibility.
I have always used the media I’ve had a need and desire to, often in context with the thoughts I have about the work.
you often illustrate women in your work, is there a specific reason for that?
Yes I’m a 18 year old teenage boy..
hahaha alright thats cool! so it’s not because you have a greater fascination with the female sex and its many emotions …. and physique?
So, of course I always thought women are beautiful and lovely, but I have never portrayed women especially graceful, there has always been a sharp edge. someone will say a little darker or gloomy.
There are actually many who find it difficult to recognize the women I use in my paintings/drawings. It is a certain feeling I get from them I want to show and not necessarily an accurate portrait.
What is your goals and aspirations with your art, if you have any?
My first goal is to enter the Danish Royal Academy of Fine Arts. I’m trying deliberately not to think too far ahead, when I as an artist still has time to develop myself in many different directions. I would obviously like as many people as possible to recognize my work. not only pleasing their eyes, but also put some thoughts in progress.
What about other form of arts than drawings/paintings?
Well, in the future, I would like to work with album covers. Using my art as a medium of music. it would be a fun challenge and at the same time bring my art into the homes of many people.
You have already worked with some different people, among other things made a poster for the Danish hip hop band “Ukendt kunstner”. Is there anyone in the future you really would like to work with?
– Right now I work a lot with different musicians, for example with album covers, etc.. Both to make myself known in the environment and to spread my art.
Do you currently live on your art?
So, I can do that part. Obviously I do not live a luxurious life, but the more recognized my art gets the more money there will of course be in it. For me it’s now not necessarily about making a lot of money. But it would obviously ease my work as an artist, not having to think about it. Being able to use all my time on art would of course be perfect!
You are talking much about making album covers, creating an immediate contact / feeling with the viewer and to communicate with the masses. Should we therefore see your art as very modern? and in the form a little less deep?
– I will not say that. There is always a lot of thought behind my work. It’s become very rare that I can finish any of my works in a day. My process has evolved a lot. From being in a long spurts, it has evolved to happen in intense fragments. Thus, there are also many more considerations over the work.
Are there any artists you specifically let yourself be inspired by?
It changes every week. of course there is some i go back to. Some artist I look much after new techniques and others I look after what thoughts behind the art. I can sometimes find it hard to see too much on others koncept art because I complete erase my thoughts and fill it with their ideas. So I try to keep my distance from it. and try to look for the little things in their works that create the whole.
Your work mixes graphic and naturalistic. Especially the woman with the parrots, which is very aesthetic in its shape much more than your other works. why is that?
That art piece is a year old now. It’s a style I’ve tried to turn away from. It was too perfectionist and photorealistic to a point where it eventually felt indifferent to finish.
So aesthetics won over emotions?
Yes and no. Of course I think the work hits something. It was just too small a idea and too much work.
Okay, how would you describe your creative process now compared to before?
Now I struck into a little more difficult time. instead to just shut me completely into myself and getting angry when my art is not just being what I have imagined, or when I make small mistakes, I learn of the error and try to make it a part of the work. for example if I spill coffee on it i allow it to be a part of the work.
So it has become a more fluid process where the image is constantly evolving. you follow the work instead of controlling it?
Yes instead of it being so mechanical. for example with “Girl” I made three different versions. I do not know if you can sense it becomes more edgy. One is very gracefully and the others is a bit more distorted.
Yes they are a little darker in the expression.
Before I started on that piece i tried to go through the emotions I wanted to express. Then I tried to get my model into the feeling and I then just started a dash and a second on the paper and then run the next line on. Typically, I work until 05 am in the morning where I sit perched in an old ceiling.
When you sit there until 05 am is so completely stoic silence or are you sitting and listening to music.
20% smoke break 30% music 50% silence.
How have you come to such a work ethic, it’s something you’ve always had?
sometimes the work just flow. You can compare it to a run, at some point you will meet the wall if you past it, you can reach new heights, but at some point you just can’t run anymore. I sometimes reach the point where I just stare off into space or going around the room for 15 minutes.
It is not often you see people at your age so passionate about the things they’re doing, do you feel that people can see the hard work behind the things you do?
Some can and some can not. But it is also the effect my works leave with people that mean a lot to me.
Do you feel that you have a place in the art world, can you see yourself in that world?
I feel I have to make my own space.
what is your view of the art world?
I feel we need a new generation, which is also in bloom. I found many of my younger fellow artist, friends and I’ve got something.
what is the difference between you and any of the more established artists? Has they become too commercial?
It is more or less just some styles and techniques which sometimes takes over their works. The art world itself is often a game snobbery where you pander for money. of course one can not generalize, the art world is many things.
what do you feel that art should be?
Art is many directions and things. but I feel it should be able to get a message out. it must be something that can define a generation and a human person.
Do you follow that definition?
I do my best, but it’s always difficult when yourself are a part of that world. I can’t view myself in a third person. but I’m still young and also like to take advice from more experienced people.
in music there has almost been a revolution with torrent sites and now streaming services. They have made music more democratic, giving air time to many new artists. has the Internet also had an impact on the art world?
If it had not been for Internet there would not be many who knew me and my work. so it can definitely be used to promote yourself and get in touch with people.
But it has not seen the same democratization.
No you can not quite compare music and art, if you for example sees a work of art in a book or online, you will be completely enraptured when you see it in reality.
yes it has a completely different effect.
Yes that’s what I like about it. You can not steal the experience altogether. it’s probably also why in the music business, concerts have such a success. it is a completely different experience than hearing an album on the computer.
I do for example not like to work with photoshop. the personality is lost, when you computerize it.
There’s a lot of new artists a few years back who came forward with photoshop, for example Shepard feary.
I do not know much about the thoughts behind a guy like Shepard Fairey beyond the repetition. It’s like the coca cola brand. his art are being burned into the mind of people because you’ve seen it so many times.
so you try to go against modern artists such as Andy warhold and Shepard Fairey? do you think it is something we should depart from?
Yes and no. I do not know. I have not yet found the way I / we must go. I think we will have to work more together to find a new way to go. Both artists, musicians and writers. Basically I am not thinking so much about the big picture when I make art. it is a form of therapy for myself where I try to empty my thoughts and grow as a person.
so you still see yourself as a young artist with a great development ahead of him?
You will never be complete the evolving, it is the infinite process. In my art I try to capture the 18 years I have lived. In my next step I try perhaps to catch the 20 years I have lived. so I’m trying very actively to seek experiences that can develop myself and my world view.
