Jørgen Haugen Sørensen

Jørgen Haugen Sørensen (born 3 October 1934, Copenhagen) is one of Denmark's most eminent sculptors. He had his artistic debut at the acclaimed and prestigious Spring Exhibition (Forårsudstillingen) at Kunsthal Charlottenborg, Copenhagen in 1953. Haugen Sørensen is a member of the artistic union Decembristerne and the artist collective Grønningen, as well as Veksølund in Denmark.

Jørgen Haugen Sørensen, 2007

The post-war and contemporary sculptor has been hailed as the greatest Danish sculptor since Bertel Thorvaldsen.[1] He has received several important distinctions for his works through the years, such as the Eckerberg Medal in 1969[2] and the Thorvaldsen Medal in 1979.[2] In 1958 he was selected to represent Denmark at the Biennale di Venezia.[1] Haugen Sørensen's sculptures are placed all around the world.[1]

Early life

As a child, together with his brother Arne, Haugen Sørensen began to draw and later to model. When he was 15, he trained as a plasterer and potter and then attended the Design School in Copenhagen. As a sculptor, however, he was self-taught.[3]

Jørgen Haugen Sørensen has spent most of his life abroad, living in a voluntary exile in Southern Europe. The 1960s he spent in Paris, France and Verona, Italy before finally settling down in the artists' town Pietrasanta in Tuscany from 1971. Despite developing a style far removed from his Danish contemporaries, Haugen Sørensen has always been highly present in his native country in exhibitions as well as in the artistic debate.[4]

Career

After his debut at Charlottenborg's spring exhibition in 1953, he rapidly gained a reputation as a sculptor who crafted works of the human body and of animals with intense expressiveness and realism. His scenes of butchery became central to his work.[5]

At the end of the 1950s during a stay on the island of Bornholm, he entered a more abstract phase, experimenting with tiled pipes and other ceramic products, although he maintained elements of the body and other recognizable phenomena. During the dramatic years of the Algerian War, he settled in Paris creating figurative sculptures in bronze from 1959 to 1963. They depict scarred, torn organic forms reflecting a reality of cruelty, fear and sexuality. He traveled widely to Italy, Germany, Spain and Yugoslavia, developing a style which was far removed from Danish culture.[1] At the end of the 1960s, he often created compositions made up of several smaller sculptures, sometimes using materials such as plastic or textiles, occasionally borrowing elements from other sculptors.[1]

After an interruption at the end of the 1960s when he turned to films, he returned to sculpture making use of marble, often combining different colours and finishes, as can be seen in his decorative work outside the School of Journalism in Aarhus. Other important works include the geometrical Huset der slikker solskin (The House which Licks Sunshine, 1980) for the Danish Institute in Rome, Dumhedens store flod (Stupidity's Great River, 1995) in Ribe, and Sorg (Sorrow, 1990) for the French University in Istanbul. His later work often consists of large angular shapes with rough surfaces as his three sculptures for the University of Lund (1994) and his 7 meters tall Colossus at the Amager Beach Park in Copenhagen.[3][2]

Throughout his career Haugen Sørensen has been rethinking how to work with sculpture, and according to him art is important precisely because it is the means through which society breathes.[6] His oeuvre can thus largely be viewed as a commentary on basic conditions of human existence.[1]

Style

Since his debut in 1953 he has without any formal training or schooling shifted between materials and modes of expression within the sculptural sphere. His artistic language has evolved throughout his career, but the production has always kept an abstract core within its diversity.[1] He has primarily worked with sculptures even though he is also an accomplished draughtsman.[1]

Haugen Sørensen's works present his views of the human condition in his own, often brutal style. His reservations about the Academy's approach are evident in his oeuvre's glaring contrast to the generally theoretical approach of his contemporaries. Free of attachment to any given idiom, Haugen Sørensen channels his creative talents to depicting his own outlook on life, capturing the basic themes of life and death, love and suffering as the focal points of his sculpture, whether working with clay, plaster, fabric, terracotta, bronze, marble or granite.[4]

Jørgen Haugen Sørensens inspiration stems from myriad places. From Francis Goya's depictions of the Spanish peoples suffering during the Franco rule to Pablo Picassos anti-war oil painting Guernica from 1937 and his own memories of childhood visits in the slaughterhouses in the Copenhagen Meat Packing District and readings of Kurt Vonnegut's novel Slaughterhouse Five from 1969. Haugen Sørensen studied Gian Lorenzo Bernini's craftmanship and marble sculptures, the Mediterranean crafts traditions and he also took away ideas from his meeting with the abstract expressionist art movement in Paris and CoBrA in the 1950s.[1]

Selected public works
  • 2017 The Crowd Pietrasanta  
  • 2013 Justitio and the Witnesses the City Court Copenhagen  
  • 2010 Lump with support The Danish National Bank  
  • 2005 That’s Why We Call Them Dogs Danish National Museum  
  • 1993 The House That Rains, Skt. Hans Torv in Copenhagen  

The task of decorating the City Court in Copenhagen was originally assigned classical sculptor Bertel Thorvaldsen 200 years ago, but it was never completed.[7]

Selected solo exhibitions

A selection of Haugen Sørensen's exhibitions includes:[5]

Selected group exhibitions

Collections

Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek, National Gallery of Denmark, Louisiana, Museum of Modern Art, Carnegie Institute, Nasjonalgalleriet, Henie Onstad Kunstsenter MoMA Museum of Modern Art, Yorkshire Sculpture Park, Portofino Sculpture Park, Kunsten Museum of Modern Art Aalborg, HEART.

In 2014 Haugen Sørensen donated a significant part of his private collection to Bornholms Kunstmuseum[8].

Awards and recognitions

Art market and fairs

Haugen Sørensen is represented by Copenhagen-based Hans Alf Gallery as well as by UK based Messums Wiltshire[9][10]. He has exhibited his work at international art fairs such as Art Herning, Scope Basel and Scope New York.

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gollark: It's kind of funny that gravel isn't renewable but gold is.
gollark: So just do that.
gollark: Most of the current bot things locally make sense but struggle to maintain coherency.
gollark: Just something the monitor packets, don't render and unrender it.

References
  1. Helleland, Allis (2007). Jørgen Haugen Sørensen : a biography. Bjerkhof, Sven., Statens museum for kunst (Denmark). [Copenhagen, Denmark]: Statens Museum for Kunst. ISBN 978-87-92023-03-2. OCLC 180194528.
  2. "Jørgen Haugen Sørensen", Den Store Danske. (in Danish) Retrieved 4 June 2012.
  3. Pia Kristine Münster, "Jørgen Haugen Sørensen", Kunstindeks Danmark & Weilbachs Kunstnerleksikon. (in Danish) Retrieved 4 June 2012.
  4. "Jørgen Haugen Sørensen at Statens Museum for Kunst" Archived 2016-09-21 at the Wayback Machine, ArtKnowledgeNews. Retrieved 5 June 2012.
  5. "Jørgen Haugen Sørensen - Biografisk oversigt". www.haugensorensen.com (in Danish). Retrieved 2020-04-14.
  6. "Jørgen Haugen Sørensen - Portrætfilm". www.haugensorensen.com (in Danish). Retrieved 2020-03-23.
  7. Winther, Tine Maria (2014-03-15). "Kunstneren og digteren har gjort det, Thorvaldsen aldrig nåede". Politiken (in Danish). Retrieved 2020-03-23.
  8. "GAVEN - Jørgen Haugen Sørensen - Bornholms Kunstmuseum". www.bornholms-kunstmuseum.dk. Retrieved 2020-03-23.
  9. "Home". www.hansalf.com. Retrieved 2020-04-20.
  10. "Messums Wiltshire - Gallery and Arts Centre - Tisbury, Wiltshire". Messums Wiltshire. Retrieved 2020-04-20.

Bibliography
  • Haugen Sørensen, Jørgen: Souvenir: Jørgen Haugen Sørensen, 1993, Copenhagen, Charlottenborg. ISBN 8788944263.
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