Brand-new paintings by the Norwegian artist Olav Christopher Jenssen fill The Nordic Watercolour Museum in the summer of 2002. The exhibition comprises 115 works – sensuous explorations of colour and form, masterfully painted freehand with a soft-haired brush. The paintings have been finished with a thin layer of wax, creating a surface that is at once diffuse and translucent.

Throughout his career, Olav Christopher Jenssen has continually evolved his artistic practice, developing pictorial worlds that exist on their own terms with both curiosity and assurance. He does not paint what he sees; rather, he sees what he paints. With an irregular regularity, these works adhere to a number of self-imposed parameters. The sheets of paper are all the same size, the colour palette is deliberately limited, as is the repertoire of forms. The rich, saturated harmonies of colour are inspired by the palette developed by the Swiss architect Le Corbusier in the 1930s. It was conceived to reflect the fundamental chords of nature, drawing on the colours of sand, sunlight and the sea, among other elements.

The relationship between the works and the exhibition space has always occupied a central place in Olav Christopher Jenssen's presentation of his exhibitions. These paintings originate in a series of works on paper from recent years, shown in the project The Empty Drawing Room. At The Nordic Watercolour Museum, he continues the investigation he began there. He plays with our expectations of what an art exhibition should look like. As the title suggests, there are no paintings hanging on the walls. Instead, Olav Christopher Jenssen arranges the works in sequences and formations across the floor, creating new conditions for the viewer. Visitors are invited to make their way along the pathways the artist has constructed and to explore the paintings from above.

Olav Christopher Jenssen was born in 1954 in Sortland, Vesterålen, Norway. He now lives and works in Berlin, Germany, and Lya, Sweden.

Olav Christopher JenssenModeration – A Section from the Empty Drawing Room

participating artists