Avesta Art 2010 - Verket

There is a feeling of reverence and awe in the newly-opened Björn Lövin gallery
in Avesta Art Stately, stylish and dignified stands “Dädsker” At first glance the
sculptures seem to support the slag-stone wall while in actual fact they give
their support to each one of us – to human dignity The name “Dädsk” stands
for the Swedish ‘Det är du som kan!’, You can do it The sculptures carry the
characteristic mark of Björn Lövin The sanctity of the individual and, at the
same time, their participation in a fellowship, a community, is a basic principle
for his artistic work
In the centre of the gallery is the car “Full fart framåt”, (Full speed ahead),
from 1988 at an exhibition in Kulturhuset in Stockholm Here the artist adopted
the role of anthropologist and explored, in an imaginary future, the debris from
the 20th century consumer society The sports car is easy to identify on one
plane At the same time its material and simplicity link it to excavations of
cultures remote from western society’s love of the motor car The vital painting
from 1995 “Vid floden”, (By the river), stretches beyond time and space
Björn Lövin was one of the greatest artists of our time He participated in the
introduction of installations in Sweden with shocking exhibitions at the Museum
of Modern Art and Kulturhuset in Stockholm That he was widely appreciated
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internationally is hardly known in Sweden In 1981 he took the prestigious
Pompidou Centre in Paris by storm with a gigantic exhibition which also included
a completely novel phenomenon, video art The headlines in Le Monde showed
great respect for Lövin’s work, a confirmation that greatly impressed his French
hosts When the UN held a major environmental conference in Rio de Janeiro
in 1992, twenty of the world’s leading sculptors and painters were invited to
participate with their works Björn Lövin was among those who represented
Europe with his enormous sculpture “Kulturmotor”, (Culture motor), a cassava
press made of hardwoods from the Amazon forests
The artist Björn Lövin passed away in 2009 He was born in Falun in 1937
and as a young man studied in Barcelona and at Stockholm and Uppsala
Universities He lived in Dicka near Avesta, in Stockholm and in his last years in
the village of Folkärna Björn Lövin took part in Avesta Art in 1997 and followed
all the Avesta Art exhibitions with a critical eye Only three artists have their
own room at the Museum of Modern Art in Stockholm – Pablo Picasso, Andy
Warhol and Björn Lövin Thanks to the kind donations of his daughters Avesta
Art now has its own Björn Lövin gallery