Interview with Lotte Fløe Christensen

SA: Nature is a recurrent theme in your work. What sort of relationship do you have with  nature – is it unproblematic or is it a fearful and ambiguous one?

LFC: I do not see nature as a theme in my practise, but more as a tool I can use to investigate questions of meaning and fragility. Having grown up in the countryside my relationship to nature is fundamentally connected to a feeling of home. For me nature is evident; is not something that is in opposition to something urban or civilized, it is simply there. The world. When that is said nature, to me, also represents feelings of loss, longing and uncertainty and is thereby something I have an ambivalent relationship to. This might be the reason for nature having such a presence in my work.

SA: Would you describe your art as romantic?

LFC: In the sense that Romanticism in some aspects deals with an individual search for meaning in a world where meaning is not given, my work can certainly be seen as Romantic. I am very interested in the search for understanding and meaning that seems to be a deeply rooted human drive.

SA: Nature seems to be a popular subject in art right now. Have you had any thoughts about this, and if yes – what do they look like?

LFC: Artists have always dealt – and worked with nature, but it might be true that there has been an increase in nature-related work over recent years. I have previously not really considered this fact. Maybe because I find it quite natural that nature is present in contemporary art. I think that because the technologies, we surround ourselves with, have developed much faster than our brains, we are often stressed and feel detached and alienated towards the lives we live. I have read quite a lot of research dealing with nature’s healing and calming affect on people. I think that nature is somehow connected to something meaningful and is therefore a great tool to talk about meaning. This might be one of the reasons why artists increasingly deal with nature.

SA: In your work photographs get mixed up with objects. You pull branches and leaves out of the photographs and place them in new, three-dimensional formations. What happens in these encounters and why haven’t you decided to work with either photography or sculpture/installations?

LFC: I am not sure I can explain what happens in the space between the photographs and the objects/installations. But something happens. I see my work as examinations of different issues of creation of meaning. To approach these quite abstract issues I have in recent years felt the need to step outside the two-dimensionality of the photographs; to use more examination-methods to get closer to the subject. I think somehow the objects and the photographs are doing the same thing in different ways.

SA: What inspires you?

LFC: Literature inspires me. And books as objects. Conversations with people. Random research I come across. Exhibitions. Thoughts of material. The gap between two images. Maybe nature.

SA: You’re interested in the manifestations and acts that come out of the search for meaning. Are you never tempted to reach a target; to find a final answer? Is it possible? And what would happen in this case?

LFC: I do not think there is a definitive answer. So luckily the search can continue.

SA: What are you exhibiting at Nextart Gallery?

LFC: The exhibition consists of photographs and small resin sculptures on podiums. The photographs deal with the idea of support and fragility, signs and action and corresponds with the cubes of resin holding semi-cast twigs and paper.