Mette Rishøj

Born Randers, Denmark, 1972. Lives and works in Copenhagen.

´The painter Mette Rishøj does not pull her punches. Her paintings are ripe with
speed and action. Machines are battering reality, disrupting harmony. Excavators
are working overtime. Huge oil platforms are spewing out fire. It crackles,
roars and sparkles. Modern life is a brutal construction - and merciless destruction.
Now, as always, art is here to document what happens around us.
The rough paintings of Mette Rishøj are in no way a keeper's items. Especially
not if you are expecting neatness and discreet aesthetics. The dramatics of the
paintings are violent. They carve into the view of the spectator; their disharmony
seems deliberate. Really, they are warnings: Everyday is as bad as this. Every
change in our environment is a small disaster. Before a new thing can be created,
something old has to be destroyed. But who says what is new is better?
This question and many more, spin into mind as you watch her spectacular
paintings. The motifs are confined to a masculine universe with hullabaloo
the jingle of the day. You might say that she challenges the dominant faith in a
future being as blind as it is widespread.
But there are much more at stake in ...

2004+05 Aeroe School of Art