Det går (It goes)

(framed).

Provenance

Galleri Nicolai Wallner, Copenhagen, Dødvågen, 22 August - 11 October 2025.

Firestorm Foundation (acquired from the above).

The Firestorm Foundation acquired Det går (It goes) and Et sted tæt på (Somewhere close) from Anna Kristine Hvid Petersen’s 2025 exhibition Dødvågen at Galleri Nicolai Wallner in Copenhagen. In conjunction with the exhibition, the gallery wrote the following in its introduction to the show:

“Dødvågen” translates to “dead awake”. The expression combines two opposites, but also uses the word ‘dead’ as an emphasiser, giving a mirror image within the verbiage. This title, and the exhibition itself, are an insistence that things can exist in multiple opposing states all at once. […] This gathering of new works shows the artist reaching to new ways of working. Hvid Petersen’s exploration of the landscape and how it can be integrated into the field of still life speaks to her dedication to the field of painting on the whole. Bringing her subjects into the plein-air and allowing the environment to permeate the arrangement, she blurs her own preconceived boundaries. […] In works like Som det kan gå (2025) and Det går (2025), the structures of the still life are exposed. Table legs wobble and stumble, or stand on soft bushy heads of wheat. Guiding the eye from the table top that might usually be used to display the still life, to the body of the table, Hvid Petersen destabilises our idea of what we consider known. All of these explorations show a desire to dissolve the categorizations of modes of working, but also of materials and their value attributions. Things that can be considered broken or undesired become a point of focus. The true lifespan of matter is integrated into death and rebirth; reconfigurations of a timeline play out. Following logics that are ambiguous, Anna Kristine Hvid Petersen exposes the irrational binaries that we hold between human and non-human, natural and man-made, object and subject, and allows the viewer to embrace a state of confusion.

Though the artist works from the tradition of baroque still life painting, with sensorial theatricality and lush details, she approaches the objects, subject matter, and the field of painting in completely new dimensions. At first glance, the paintings’ composition and exquisite technique seem to nod towards the traditions of still life, yet this implied simplicity dissolves at closer examination. Shadows are inaccurate. Backgrounds are both captivating and deceptive, pushing the context in new directions. The objects themselves are also unexpected, as Hvid Petersen combines the familiar with the unknown to intentionally create dynamic narratives—the explanations to which feel almost within our grasp, but just almost. The predominant use of smaller formats echoes this sentiment and this intensity. The size of the paintings compels us to come closer, to lean farther in, to almost fall into this other world, as if our proximity to the works might give way to a deeper understanding of them.

The result is playful as well as captivating, since Hvid Petersen’s works cleverly allude to a reality which is ours but, at the same time, still isn’t. Her paintings hint at a reality that could be playing out not here, but somewhere nearby, as well as at an evolving and growing storyline that builds layer on layer.

In this respect Hvid Petersen could be regarded as a worthy contemporary successor to earlier celebrated generations of Scandinavian surrealist painters. Comparisons could be made to works by artists such as Erik Olson (1901–1986, Swedish surrealist artist, and member of the legendary Halmstadgruppen, who devoted himself to dreamlike, over-realistic artwork) and Vilhelm Bjerke-Petersen (1909-1957, Danish surrealist painter who studied under Paul Klee and Wassily Kandinsky at Bauhaus Dessau, Germany, 1930-1931, and later influenced painters like Karen Holtsmark, Bjarne Rise and Johannes Rian).

Further comparisons could, obviously, be made to even more internationally acclaimed painters such as the legendary Spanish surrealist artist Salvador Dalí (1904-1989), who, much like Hvid Petersen, was renowned for his technical skill, precise draughtsmanship, and the striking and bizarre images often found in his work. It is interesting to note that Dali (like Hvid Petersen in Det går) often depicted legs in an exaggeratedly elongated and wobbly manner in pictures like The Temptation of St. Anthony (1946, oil on canvas, 90 x 119.5 cm, Royal Museum of Fine Arts Belgium, Brussels) and The Elephants (1948, oil on canvas, 49 x 60 cm, private collection).

Comparisons aside, perhaps the most straightforward conclusion would be that Hvid Petersen stands(on wobbly legs or not) alone in her distinctive contemporary artistry, where traditional realistic easel painting, combined with underlying metaphysical imagery, conjures up unique pictorial worlds for us viewers to lose ourselves in.