A Copenhagen gallery in Kolding… by Connie Boe Boss
When I write that SPACE is a Copenhagen gallery, I mean that it is so professional, quality-conscious and artistically interesting that it could easily manage in Copenhagen's large range of good galleries and I think that if it was located there, it could achieve a certain cult status as the place where you see new, different and challenging art. The gallery has a young vibe and a certain hip factor I think.
This is because the owner, Dutch Ronald Hofman, who started SPACE in 2022, has a good eye for the special art with an edge, whether it is Pop-Art, classical painting, bad-painting or challenging sculptures and politicizing visual art – for now to mention some of the genres the gallery had to offer when I visited it last week.
When I asked Ronald Hofman why the gallery is called SPACE and why he uses the Japanese character for "space", he replied that "space" means room, place or universe. And that the physical gallery and the art itself is a place or a universe where you can experience your own inner place in the encounter with the artwork.
SPACE, translated directly from the Japanese word 宇宙, must be a universe where you can explore, embrace and experience art and above all offer a room to mentally recharge and nourish the visitor's mind.
Hofman himself completely calms down and gets a clear inner feeling when he enters his gallery. Not because this is Zen-like black and white; on the contrary, here are colorful, edgy works on walls and podiums, but in a tasteful, calm interior. These are works that have something to say, just as he himself has a lot to say, simply because he loves art. He wants to show art that suits people – and not the sofa.
He says that he himself has always been very inspired by Japan, e.g. The Shogun films, and he himself has created art in Manga style, e.g. on skateboards. It was therefore natural that the Japanese characters for SPACE should be included in the gallery's logo, without the gallery's focus on Japanese art.
The gallery contains both Danish and international contemporary art by established artists. Right now he is showing a group exhibition "NO FAKE NEWS, JUST ART.." with two Danish and a number of foreign artists, and most of them are artists you don't see anywhere else here in the country. He also believes that it is the gallery's mission to encourage upcoming artists by offering them a place to show their art, if the quality is right.
I will not mention all participating artists, but mention German Christopher Kieling, whose oil paintings in the realistic, figurative genre are totally elaborate and very beautiful, and English Heath Kane, who has created painted silkscreen prints in an extremely interesting series called "Happy propaganda". and which take power, masses, propaganda and politics under consideration in socially critical works.
I would also like to highlight the Dutch sculptor Maartje Bos, who has created The Cock Collection, which are very simple, clean and clear in their sculptural expression. The series is about the artist wanting to praise a healthy and proud self-esteem, and she expresses this as the masculine energy that is in a penis. To make a long story short.
The two Danes are Anton Ian Nielsen, whom I am personally very fond of and who paints in a loose, very personal style slightly beyond the Bad Painting genre, with imaginative narrative universes where painting rules and perspective are abolished, and Kim Pihl, whose oil works can stylistically placed as PopArt.
Finally, I would also like to mention English Rob Draper, designer and collage artist, whose works lie somewhere between kitsch, graphics and scrapping in a really captivating way. Here you can acquire a really nice, framed work for only DKK 7,500.
And precisely this is important to the gallerist: to have both expensive and cheaper works in his exhibitions, so that everyone can participate, and not least young people can start a collection by visiting him.
SPACE is located in Olaf Ryes Gade 7R st.th. 6000 Kolding - and when it's not Kongens Nytorv in Copenhagen, it takes a bit of time for most people to visit the gallery - but it's worth it! Optionally combine with a visit to Trapholt, Koldinghus or the ceramics gallery Pagter.
AND keep an eye out for SPACE at upcoming fairs too!
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