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Since Roman times copper has been associated with beauty and femininity, which is not surprising given its sensuous appearance when highly polished. It is named after Cyprus, which was the birthplace of Aphrodite, the goddess of love (whom the Romans called Venus). The alchemists of the middle ages and renaissance used the symbol for Venus to denote copper, and this symbol is also used today to denote ‘female’.
In spite of its aesthetic features and links to Aphrodite, copper is a cold and dead metal. Enter Marie Louise Kold, a Danish artist living and working in Sweden. She describes herself as a metal artist, who fell in love with copper when she was an art student. Over the years she has developed her own ways of transforming the surfaces of copper, and its alloys bronze and brass, so that they have vivid, and sometimes iridescent, colours. These stunningly coloured pieces of metal, which are produced without the use of paints, are then assembled into her works of art.
Recently, the nature that surrounds her rural home in southern Sweden has captured her soul. The result is that Marie Louise’s art has been ‘invaded’ by copper lifeforms. While these new lifeforms do have similarities to those found in nature, they are products of the artist’s imagination and are totally new to this world. Mushrooms with two stalks, or with layered frills like multiple petticoats vie for attention with delicate flowers, ephemeral lichen-like growths, twisted seaweed or metal barnacles – all in gorgeous colours. Marie Louise calls these works VÄXT, which is Swedish for plant or life. It seems like she has succeeded where alchemists have failed – she has breathed life into the inanimate, and her creations are worthy of their own kingdom of life.
More info: mlkold.com
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