This summer's presentation of works from Louisiana's collection stood as a testimony to how new connections, dynamics and themes arise in the encounter and mix between modern classics, well-known favorites, new acquisitions and contemporary art.
In the museum’s South Wing, one could experience a rich and varied selection of works from the museum’s collection throughout the summer: painting, video, sculpture and photography, created and collected over the almost seven decades that have passed since Louisiana opened. And signed by names such as Francis Bacon, Roy Lichtenstein, William Kentridge, Ana Mendieta, Nan Goldin and Ed Ruscha.
The variety of works and expressions were juxtaposed under an ambiguous title referring to a major work by American Martha Rossler, ‘House Beautiful: Bringing the War Home’.
These photomontages, in which Rosler combines images of homes in lifestyle magazines with images from the Vietnam War, date from the years 1967-1972. However, the series was new to the museum’s collection and a testament to Louisiana’s ambitious goal of collecting along multiple tracks – in this case, to “cover gaps in history” by adding a significant work by a significant artist who has not previously been represented in the collection.
Overall, the juxtaposition of “new” and classical works, paired with pieces that have not been shown for a long time, led to new dialogues and connections that unfolded in a number of main themes in ‘House Beautiful’.
Painting and memories
At the entrance to the South Wing, one passed by Yoko Ono's series 'Vertical Memory' as well as Daya Cahen's terrifying 'Nashi', an "undercover film" shot in a Russian youth camp. In the first main room, the focus was on painting, centered around Peter Doig's masterpiece 'Music of the Future'.
The paintings ranged across time – from 1929 to 2007 – and geography, but were linked by the artists’ preoccupation with figuration. These were images of something, even if this something does not necessarily belong to the external world. Here were paintings by, among others, Francis Bacon, Frank Auerbach, Wilhelm Freddie and George Condo, as well as a single sculpture group by Germaine Richier.
The next theme – which took its title from Mamma Andersson’s landscape painting ‘The Day After’ – transcended forms of expression, generations and national borders to find kinship between artists who are concerned with the significance of the past for our existence now. As seen, for example, in ruins, maps of appropriated territories or fleeting imprints on the ground. Here were works by, among others, Pia Arke, William Kentridge, Anselm Kiefer and Mohammed Sami.
Time and place
The 1970s were the common denominator for the next room, showing how a decade can encompass a multitude of artistic directions and forms of expression with no seeming relation. Despite the differences, the works shown – by, among others, Ana Mendieta, Roy Lichtenstein, Andy Warhol, Sam Gilliam and Tetsumi Kudo – were all about what art is and should be.
New in the collection
Taking the stairs - passing Richard Prince's cowboy and Arthur Jafa's 'MJ' – one could find a selection of works that have been acquired by or donated to the museum in recent years (2022-2025).
In addition to the aforementioned series of photomontages by Martha Rosler, works by, among others, Ed Ruscha, Nan Goldin, Julie Mehretu and Robert Longo were presented here on the upper floor with access to the Panorama Room. In a side room here you could watch Louisiana Channel interviews with several of the artists, represented in this presentation.
ABOUT THE COLLECTION
Louisiana’s collection is a dynamic entity that not only continues to grow, but also moves around the house, where it is included in selected presentations throughout the year. This is necessary to make room for the changing exhibitions, for which the house’s permanent works thus become a kind of sounding board. But at the same time, it provides the opportunity to show the individual works in new ways and in changing constellations.
