White Cube Hong Kong presents an exhibition of new paintings by Sergej Jensen. This marks Jensen’s third exhibition with the gallery and first exhibition in Asia.

Jensen’s work is abstract to the point of negation. Using the principles of the readymade, he draws attention to the incidental details of his materials, transforming leftovers from past projects into new works as a gesture of self-reflexivity. In Grey Plastic Scar (2013) torn pieces of material are carefully sewn and then painted over, so that they appear like past scars under skin whose dynamic verticals create their own linear composition. Patch-worked money bags, suggestive of a symbiotic relationship between art and money, are used as a ground for Money Bags (2013) and a series of black monochrome works are made by charring the outline of an abstract shape directly onto the canvas in Brown Diamond (2013). While these latter works adhere to the idea of painting without paint, the texture and pigment of their charred crust mimics the tactility of paint itself. In Untitled (2013) Jensen has dyed an American quilt an inky Prussian blue, while allowing the other colours of the found textile to emerge as burgundy fan shapes that appear to float on the work’s surface.

Veering between a kind of abstract nihilism on the one hand, and the merest hint of representation on the other, Jensen’s pictures remain unsentimental and impassive. In one work entitled Teracotta Scar (2013), for example, which employs a neutral beige ground, tiny patches of embroidery are built up into protean shapes, which while purely abstract, are reminiscent of insects or other natural forms moving across the canvas surface. When viewed from a distance, they could equally take on the anthropomorphic qualities of a human face. In Incense (2013), which appears to deftly combine the purposeful with the accidental, delicate traces of ash burnt by incense sticks form repetitive lines that emerge from the bottom of a canvas. Their linear pattern extends from the wooden frame, the singed markings evidence of where the sticks initially rested.

About the artist:

Sergej Jensen was born in Denmark in 1973, and lives and works in New York and Berlin. Solo exhibitions include the Fred Thieler Prize, Berlinische Galerie, Berlin (2013); MoMA PS1, New York (2011); Portikus, Frankfurt am Main and the Aspen Art Museum, Aspen (2010); Malmö Konsthall (2008); Pinakothek Der Moderne (with Henrik Olesen), Munich (2008); 'Schmoll', Kunsthalle Bergen, Norway (2008); Malmö Konsthall, Sweden (2008); 'Nomadic Bags and Bag Faces' Douglas Hyde Gallery, Dublin (2007); Kunstverein Bremerhaven, Germany (2004) and Kunstverein Braunschweig (with Stefan Müller) Germany (2003). His work has also been exhibited in a number of major international group exhibitions including ‘Annette Kelm, Sergej Jensen, Wolfgang Breuer’, Kunstwerke Berlin (2009); 'Of Mice and Men', Berlin Biennial (2006); 'Momentum Nordice Festival of Contemporary Art', Moss (2006) and the São Paulo Biennial (2004).

-White Cube

Image: © Serjej Jensen
Acrylic painting lll
2013
Acrylic on linen
216 x 115cm
Courtesy White Cube