Two of the brightest stars on the international scene of contemporary art – the Danish Michael Elmgreen and the Norwegian Ingar Dragset – have taken over SMK with their exhibition Biography.
It is their first major exhibition in Denmark, and they've brought along an entire apartment complex with fully furnished apartments as well as a number of sculptures.
The exhibition is shaped as a filmic scenography where visitors can actively participate as protagonists, not just as passive spectators.
Elmgreen and Dragset like to challenge our expectations.
By creating misplaced and paradoxical scenarios they provoke our habitual patterns, often with a startling effect.
In their extensive installations, the artists often merge the seemingly real with the fantastical – using humour, poetry, and spectacular visual devices.
The duo met in Copenhagen in 1995 where Elmgreen was writing and performing poetry and Dragset studied theater. For the first 10 years of their artistic collaboration, they were also a couple.
Apart from exhibiting their work at various art institutions and biennials in Europe, Asia, and the Americas, Elmgreen and Dragset have also created a wide range of projects in public spaces.
Prominent examples include their bronze sculpture of a boy astride a rocking horse on Trafalgar Square in London as well as the outdoor sculpture 'He' permanently installed at Kronborg in Helsingør.
Opens Sep 19; Statens Museum for Kunst, Sølvgade 48-50, København K; smk.dk
