Lasse Schmidt Hansen

13 January 2012–11 February 2012

Press release

Lasse Schmidt Hansen’s minimalist works are often composed of everyday materials: A jacket, a stack of documents, black and white photographs of the studio, window blinds, a wall-to-wall carpet, objects that all seems to share a certain un-dramatic anonymity and fragile, impermanent appearance. Despite its mundane or serial produced appearance, Schmidt Hansen’s work departs from a formal as well as conceptual interest in challenging the very logic in which these things are ordered and operate. In deconstructing pre-conceived structures whether that be standardized commodities, or the act of producing and displaying art itself the artist focuses our attention back to the way certain things are identified and ordered and how this inflicts on our perceptions and behaviours. Schmidt Hansen’s investigations never reach any conclusive statements about the nature of things; instead he explores the indefinite or inconsistent properties of the objects, adding a poetic layer to his work. Even if there might be a personal story or interest connected to a specific piece, this is not necessarily an aspect that defines the reading of it. In this sense Schmidt Hansen always lets multiple stories unfold on the production of meaning and the logics with which we define and organize ourselves. Work that at first sight might appear impermeable turns out to be a multifaceted kaleidoscope that by distorting the familiar view on the world allows us to gain new perspectives on it.