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SW: Do you have heroes? You alternate between portraying purely fictional and mythical characters, and actual people who not infrequently have been deeply involved in life's darker regions. for example, one of the people you have previously depicted, Aleister Crowley, ultimately becomes as much a mythological figure as Charon in his boat.Time can demonize or make someone harmless. FS: I am interested in portraying the heroic and the archetypal conduct of a hero.The sacrifice. in order to be a hero you must sacrifice something. A motif I used in the past returns in one of the new paintings, King Domalde from Carl Larsson's painting Midvinterblot. The King sacrifices himself for the country in hope for a better harvest – a classic mythological motif. The well-known image of Perseus holding up the head of Medusa is also included in one of the paintings. He did what you expect from a hero – rescuing women in distress and killing varying types of monsters. William Blake's image of Los entering the tomb is also present as a fragment, he carries the sun. Blake went his own way and established his own world and mythology. That's heroic, something every artist should aspire to. Aleister Crowley was not a hero, but he also went his own way, trying to realize his spiritual ideals, he was an enormously egotistical person and his life ended in misery. but yes, one can say that he has been mythologized by popular culture, he regulary occurs in various contexts even though he's been dead for 60 years. Time allows facts to be forgotten, free fantasy roam and new stories arise.That is interesting. SW: I think I see a movement in your new works, like an animation roaring in front of my eyes. Then it suddenly shifts to a contemplative calm in the images of architectural facades and in the dark abstractions. How would you rank the various mythical figures that you work with and what worlds and stories have had the greatest influence on you, both in general and in connection with the works for this exhibition? FS: Yes, opposites like order and chaos, movement and contemplation intrigue me. There really isn't any systematic or hierarchical order in the new paintings of flowing chaotic character. I imagine the image as a stage, a reflection of how the gods regarded humans in the myths, as chess pieces, creatures that could be used for their own purposes.The gods intervened in human undertakings and existence. Many of the characters perform acts, one is eating an apple, another carries the sun and a third is holding up a severed head. All this generates motion. This is a book where the reader only gets to see details of the artworks, never the whole image, in order to experience the full story one must see the real paintings. New narratives arise from the fragments, your imagination assemble things differently. I'm interested in many different stories, including Greek mythology, stories about Hades, the Arthur legend and biblical scenes. SW: I've been thinking about how your works on the one hand are looking back on historical events and other cultural worlds of ideas and symbolic realms, but as education and the canon of knowledge changes, part of a contemporary audience may encounter some of these gods and goddesses or cult objects for the first time.You present anew stories that a hundred years ago were present in people's minds. FS: People lived closer to the myths and the great stories in the past, they were more familiar with the bible, for example. I believe of course that there are issues and stories that are deeply rooted in most human cultures and people: death, birth, the young man who sets out in the world, the old wise woman to name a few. dreams also seem to be universal even if they now contain technological inventions that did not exist a hundred years ago. I would like my paintings to be perceived as cult objects or fetishes, the painting is unique, it's an exclusive object. gold and mineral pigments such as Lapis Lazuli, Azurite, burnt bones.These are the old signs of art, the icon, and there's a power in that. &nbsP;You are right to point out that education today is different from a hundred years ago, when artists probably knew more about the ancient myths and about how to draw a hand anatomically correct or how to make oil paint. Now, on the other hand artists know more about queer theory, postcolonial studies and ecology. it's not that I long for the return to some sort of feudal male cult of genius. On the contrary, I think people should embrace their innermost desires. What is considered important knowledge is constantly changing. in a hundred years people will probably think that much of today's art is completely incomprehensible. |
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