Bjarne Melgaard (born 9 September 1967) is a Norwegian artist based in

New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...

. He has been described as "one of Norway's most important artists" and, following the 2014 publicity about his sculpture ''Chair'', "the most famous Norwegian artist since

Edvard Munch Edvard Munch ( ; ; 12 December 1863 – 23 January 1944) was a Norwegian painter. His 1893 work ''The Scream'' has become one of Western art's most acclaimed images. His childhood was overshadowed by illness, bereavement and the dread of inher ...

Life and work

Melgaard was born in

Sydney Sydney is the capital city of the States and territories of Australia, state of New South Wales and the List of cities in Australia by population, most populous city in Australia. Located on Australia's east coast, the metropolis surrounds Syd ...

, Australia to Norwegian parents, and was raised in

Oslo Oslo ( or ; ) is the capital and most populous city of Norway. It constitutes both a county and a municipality. The municipality of Oslo had a population of in 2022, while the city's greater urban area had a population of 1,064,235 in 2022 ...

, Norway. In 2009, he moved permanently to New York. Melgaard studied at the

Norwegian National Academy of Fine Arts The Norwegian National Academy of Arts () was a former Norwegian tertiary institution in Oslo, offering studies in the area of fine art. Along with four other academies, it merged to form the Oslo National Academy of the Arts (, KHiO) in 1996. ...

Rijksakademie The Rijksakademie van beeldende kunsten (State Academy of Fine Arts) was founded in 1870 in Amsterdam. It is a classical academy, a place where philosophers, academics and artists meet to test and exchange ideas and knowledge. The school supports ...

Amsterdam Amsterdam ( , ; ; ) is the capital of the Netherlands, capital and Municipalities of the Netherlands, largest city of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. It has a population of 933,680 in June 2024 within the city proper, 1,457,018 in the City Re ...

from 1991 to 1992 and at the

Jan van Eyck Academie The Van Eyck – Multiform Institute for Fine Art, Design, and Reflection (formerly known as “Jan van Eyck Academie”) is a post-academic institute for research and production in the fields of fine art, design and art theory, based in Maastrich ...

Maastricht Maastricht ( , , ; ; ; ) is a city and a Municipalities of the Netherlands, municipality in the southeastern Netherlands. It is the capital city, capital and largest city of the province of Limburg (Netherlands), Limburg. Maastricht is loca ...

from 1992 to 1993. Early in his career Melgaard created controversial installations referencing subversive subcultures such as S&M and heavy metal music. Currently, his practice consists of an emphasis on

expressionistic Expressionism is a modernist movement, initially in poetry and painting, originating in Northern Europe around the beginning of the 20th century. Its typical trait is to present the world solely from a subjective perspective, distorting it radi ...

painting Painting is a Visual arts, visual art, which is characterized by the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a solid surface (called "matrix" or "Support (art), support"). The medium is commonly applied to the base with ...

s and

drawing Drawing is a Visual arts, visual art that uses an instrument to mark paper or another two-dimensional surface, or a digital representation of such. Traditionally, the instruments used to make a drawing include pencils, crayons, and ink pens, some ...

s, often containing text. His first show in New York was in 2000, where he exhibited sculptures of apes engaged in sex acts. In January 2014, Melgaard's artwork ''Chair'' caused controversy. ''Chair'' is a sculpture of a bound black woman on her back with a seat cushion on her thighs, and is a reinterpretation of a similar piece by British pop artist Allen Jones. The controversy began when Russian art socialite

Dasha Zhukova Darya "Dasha" Alexandrovna Zhukova (; born 8 June 1981) is a Russian-American art collector, businesswoman, magazine editor, and socialite. She is the founder of the Garage Museum of Contemporary Art and ''Garage Magazine''. Early life and edu ...

was photographed sitting on the cushion for a fashion website, resulting in online accusations of racism under the

Twitter Twitter, officially known as X since 2023, is an American microblogging and social networking service. It is one of the world's largest social media platforms and one of the most-visited websites. Users can share short text messages, image ...

hashtag #racistchair. Guardian critic Jonathan Jones suggested that this controversy was a misunderstanding of Melgaard's intentions, and Zhukova said that the photograph of her was "out of context"; the artwork intended to be a "commentary on gender and racial politics". Melgaard himself released a statement responding to the controversy that was labelled by some writers as "bizarre". Melgaard has collaborated with Norwegian artist Sverre Koren Bjertnaes in several exhibitions. The two alternate to work on the same canvas, giving them an expression neither of the artists would achieve alone.

Notable exhibitions

2019 *''Naturally Naked'', Gary Tatintsian Gallery, Moscow 2013 *"Bjarne Melgaard", Astrup Fearnley,

*"Ignorant Transparencies", Gavin Brown’s Enterprise, New York 2012 *"A House to Die In",

Institute of Contemporary Arts The Institute of Contemporary Arts (ICA) is an modernism, artistic and cultural centre on The Mall (London), The Mall in London, just off Trafalgar Square. Located within Nash House, part of Carlton House Terrace, near the Duke of York Steps a ...

, London 2008 *''Bjarne Melgaard'', Greene Naftali Gallery, New York 2007 *''The Glamour Chase'', Galleri Faurschou, Copenhagen 2006 *''Helter Helter'', Galerie Anne De Villepoix, Paris *''Les Super'', Galerie Guido W. Baudach, Berlin *''A Weekend of Painting; A novel by Les Super'', Galerie Leo Koenig, New York 2005 *''Jasmine La Nuit'', The Horse Hospital, London *''Hallo Maybe'', Haugar Vestfold Museum, Oslo 2004 *''Tirol Transfer'', Oesterreichisches Kulturforum, Warsaw 2003 *''Skam'', Bergen Kunsthall, Bergen *''The End of The Professional Teenager'', Sketch, London 2002 *''Black Low'', MARTa Herford Museum, Hannover *''Galleria d’Arte Moderna'', Bologna 2001 *''New Heimat'', Kunstverein Frankfurt 2000 *''Sharing Exoticisms'', 5th Biennale de Lyon Melgaard appears in ''Until the Light Takes Us'', a documentary about the Norwegian

black metal Black metal is an extreme metal, extreme subgenre of heavy metal music. Common traits include Tempo#Beats per minute, fast tempos, a Screaming (music)#Black metal, shrieking vocal style, heavily distorted Electric guitar, guitars played with tr ...

scene in the 1990s. The film featured in the 15th Athens International Film Festival (16–27 September 2009), screened at Danaos Cinema. In the film, an exhibition of Melgaard's in a Stockholm gallery is extensively shown, along with his comments on black/death metal.

References

External links

Find yourself a different place to die! The debate regarding Ekely: Melgaard wishes to build in Munchs immediate proximity
{{DEFAULTSORT:Melgaard, Bjarne Living people 1967 births Artists from Sydney Gay artists Norwegian contemporary artists 21st-century Norwegian LGBTQ people 21st-century Norwegian artists Alumni of Rijksakademie van beeldende kunsten