Sculptural greeting cards and a 'miraculous' art exhibition

1. Fundamentalism – a ’miraculous’ exhibition

2. Sculptural greeting cards

3. Galschiøts Polar Bear Army takes on COP22 in Morocco

One of 6 greeting cards - see all here.

Dear

Christmas and New Year is upon us, and whether one celebrates it or not, most people find joy in a couple of days off from work. At Gallery Galschiøt we are preparing for a needed vacation, wrapping up work and lowering statues into our acid basins to ad layers of copper through an electrolysis-process.

Galschiøts sculptures often have a ‘social’ (and a bit sinister) side to them. Therefore we’ve decided to cheer things up a little by giving away free Christmas cards with photos of sculptures. If you want one but live abroad, you can get it here and print it yourself.

The Art Project The Children of Abraham starts a religious dialogue. Galschiøts Fundamentalism/Children of Abraham- exhibition has just been evaluated after three months in public space. We believe that we’ve found a truly incredible way to nurture the societal religious debate though art.

The sculpture presents the brightest and darkest quotations from the Quran, the Bible and the Torah. During the exhibition period a number of public debates were made by the municipality, which also reached out to a large number of schools that debated the subject on basis of the exhibition.

In Denmark the public debate concerning religion is most often one sided and rather hateful, leaving nearly no room for reflection and real dialogue. Often right winged provocateurs and Christians lead the debate, with the aim of pointing out how terrible Islam is.

The evaluation shows, that not only did the exhibition start a real dialogue in which the town's youth was interested and participated actively. The Muslims actually turned out to be proud to have their religion represented alongside the Christian, on the same terms. For the first time they experienced a dialogue that was not out to bash Islam, but discussed how to treat religion as a whole. All of the three religions have more or less the same bright and dark sides, and are difficult to distinct from one another and this is a central point in the art piece.

Art can be so much more than aesthetics. This exhibition shows some of the potentials of social art. It exhibits how a simple art piece can start a real debate which many have found impossible to make in Denmark. Social Art might not save the world. But the art elites focus on non-social art hinders a relevant social debates based on artistic interpretations.

We are happy to see that this sculpture installation has opened up for a serious debate about a difficult subject. We can't wait to see the reactions in the EU parliament when we exhibit parts of the project centrally in the building in July 2017.

We at Gallery Galschiøt hope You have a fantastic Christmas and a Happy New Year

All the best

Lasse Markus, Chief communications officer at Gallery Galschiøt

The Polar Bear Army attended COP22 in Morocco

Our polar bear army attended the environmental conference COP22 in Marrakesh. The polar bears were originally created for COP21 in Paris where they became quite popular and could be seen on in newspapers across the world.

It is the Danish school, Faxehus efterskole, which brought the polar bear army to Morocco where they roamed the streets of Marrakesh with theatrical performances to focus on the climate crisis.

The Polar Bear Army was part of the art project Unbearable in which a natural-size copper polar bear is impaled on an oil pipeline in shape of a graph, showing the cumulative global fossil fuel carbon emissions. The graph shows the emissions since year 0. It continues along the round for 17 metres, then rises dramatically around year 1850 as human consumption of fossil fuels like coal and oil takes off. The graph end in year 2015 five metres above ground impaling the polar bear.

The EU parliament in Bruxelles

July 2017 – Installation in the EU parliament in Bruxelles. Danish MEP Bendt Bendtsen, has invited Galschiot to exhibit 10 'Pillar of Scripture'- sculptures as a part of the dialogue project The Children of Abraham. It highlights the dogmas from three different monotheistic religions, Christianity, Judaism, and Islam. See concept

The 10 The Pillars of Scriptures will be exhibited in the middle of their parliament. On the sculptures' screens the 100 darkest and brightest quotes from the New Testament, The Torah, and The Quran are shown in 9 different languages. Jens Galschiøt and four of his colleagues will watch over the installation in Bruxelles. More about this in the new year.

STAVANGER- Norway

Galschiots 9 homeless sculptures are exhibited around Stavanger until January 2017 to create a dialogue about the tense social climate in Norway. The sculptures were made in partnership with The Committee to prevent Homelessness, and have been exhibited all over Europe.

A copper sculpture of a homeless man on a bench is already permanently exhibited in the EU parliament. It was donated by the Danish government as a reminder of the poverty which persists throughout the EU.

*****************************

ABOUT GALLERY GALSCHIOT

Gallery Galschiot is owned by sculptor Jens Galschiot and consists 2500 m2 studio and museum. The place is one of Denmark's most spectacular and biggest private art workshops. The place is full of activities, and besides the artist's workshop, there is also a bronze foundry, gallery shop, art schools, wicker workshop, TV-studios, Sculpture Park and a 400 m2 art gallery.

The entire area is approximately 10.000 m2 and it is open for audience all working days between 9am and 5pm. It is open at Sundays between 12am and 4pm. - Closed during the Saturday and other holidays. You can book a guided tour. Free admission.

If you visit Jens Galschiot at his great atelier and workshop, with dedicated people, you will get a feeling of witnessing something great, and as time goes, the life's work will start to form and be seen in the greater perspective, you will understand that this art goes further than the borders of Denmark.

Jens Galschiot is one of a kind on the international and Danish art scene, and his artistic activities have attracted much attention all around the world. His intense commitment, energy and artistic talent has something to say, and his sculptures and art happenings touches everybody who sees them. The entire artistic work is mainly about having something to say and having the heart in the right place - to make the world's sufferings and taboos visible and make the viewer think and make up his own opinion about the matter.

This is art that is not subject to the bourgeois norms. It dares to move against the stream, and that is what great art is about. The strength of the work is that it does not end up in a rigid protest, but offers genuine indignation paired with emotions, aesthetics, sensuality, energy, and humour.

- Recommendation from a visitor at Gallery Galschiot.