CHRISTOFFER MAHLKNECHT

Stockholm, November 10 – December 16, 2023

GSA Gallery is pleased to present Christoffer Mahlknecht’s first solo exhibition together with the gallery. The exhibition Fast ljus, Flytande skugga features sculptural painting.

Mahlknecht is a Swedish visual artist who works with oil and beeswax on canvas. The entire process usually begins with Mahlknecht sculpting a solid form, often using putty or plaster. He then heats beeswax with oil paint, which is poured into foil molds and solidifies into a physical mass, almost like clay. The solidified oil and beeswax mixture becomes like a crayon, which is then rubbed onto the canvas. The friction warms the paint, causing it to flow over the texture. However, the colour does not cover the entire surface before it solidifies. Therefore, there is a gradual expansion of the paint over time as different layers are applied and sometimes removed with the help of a scraper. This process often results in pits or cracks in the texture, allowing previous layers of colours to shine through.

This is where abstract painting comes to the forefront, in the transitions between solid and liquid forms, through friction. Heated paint and beeswax interact in a surprising but astonishing symphony. New layers both follow and shift underlying forms, creating a pendulum movement between the physical and the illusory. Through delay and revision, fragments of light and shadow are applied, scraped, and buried to re-emerge with renewed vigor, in a new era, through layers and cavities from what was. Mahlknecht effortlessly navigates the border between painting and sculpture, and it is here that sculptural painting takes shape.

Christoffer Mahlknecht, born in 1987, lives and works in Stockholm. Mahlknecht holds a BFA from the Valand Academy, University of Gothenburg, and an MFA from Umeå Academy of Fine Arts in 2022. He has received the Familjen Wikander Scholarship, the Eric Ericson Scholarship, and the Umeå Academy of Fine Arts Scholarship. Mahlknecht’s works are represented in the Umeå municipality and in private collections.