TROJAN
LELLO//ARNELL
23.02.2017 - 01.02.2018
Oslo S
TROJAN
Reflection has always been a key element in the artistic practice of Jørgen Craig Lello & Tobias Arnell. Through their work with the world view as concept, they have approached the fragmented brittleness of reality as a physical manifestation, where the viewer and space she occupies are subjected to a skewed quantum reality.
For TROJAN, the city is the viewer; deconstruced and reassembled in the 94 black, high-gloss facade panels mounted in varying angles onto the exterior of the building. It slips seamlessly into the arrays of new, shiny and “innovative” buildings occupying the area around the central station.
Oslo is a city experiencing rapid growth - it will increase its population by more than two hundred thousand inhabitants towards 2040. The questions arise: How is a great city built - and for whom? What world view, vision and priorities will dictate? And what are the concequences if it is done wrong? If only one could peer into the crystall ball to find the answers!
Thanks to:
Vink Norway, Fritzøe og Kreativt Bygg
LELLO//ARNELL
Jørgen Craig Lello & Tobias Arnell have collaborated since 2003 and utilize logically broken trains of thought, false statements and fictional scenarios in their examination of how the world is interpreted and understood.
They primarily work with sculpture, though it often bleeds into photography, collage and image-works. Visually, the pieces hold a resigned trash- and DIY-aesthetic, with pretensions of slickness. Though the works are fundamentally idea-based, they are saturated with a strong, underlying material and sculptural disposition.
Their work questions basic social structures and methods, and their validity. By using historical documents, symbols and events, a wide range of interconnected concepts are subjected to a deconstructive process which emanates in a skewed perception of «the big picture».
The main theme in the works is the way the topics have been treated, which constructs an interpretation that feels complete, though invalid, or even preposterous.
