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WG.113

Anna Pajak

Medusas Skratt

February 10 - March 19, 2022

Anna Pajak

Anna Pajak
Medusas Skratt, 2021 
Oil on Canvas 
180 x 180 cm / 71 x 71 in

Anna Pajak, Metamorfos, 2021

Anna Pajak

Metamorfos, 2021

Oil on canvas

180 x 180 cm / 71 x 71 in

Anna Pajak Svärd, 2021 

Anna Pajak
Svärd, 2021 
Blown Glass
50 cm 

Anna Pajak

Anna Pajak 
Chromophobia, 2022 
Oil on Canvas
190 x 190 cm / 74 x 74 in

Anna Pajak

Anna Pajak 
Besatt, 2022 
Oil on Canvas
200 x 190 cm / 78 x 74 in 

Anna Pajak  Samvaro, 2022 

Anna Pajak 
Samvaro, 2022 
Oil on Canvas 
96 x 96 cm / 37 x 37 in 

Anna Pajak Ton, 2022 

Anna Pajak
Ton, 2022 
Oil on Canvas 
66 x 66 cm / 25 x 25 in

Anna Pajak  Prolog, 2022 

Anna Pajak 
Prolog, 2022 
Oil on Canvas 
66 x 66 cm / 25 x 25 in 

Anna Pajak  Omsluten, 2022 

Anna Pajak 
Omsluten, 2022 
Oil on Canvas 
66 x 66 cm / 25 x 25 in 

Anna Pajak Spelrum, 2021

Anna Pajak
Spelrum, 2021
Oil on Canvas 
66 x 66 cm / 25 x 25 in

Anna Pajak Svärd, 2021 

Anna Pajak
Svärd, 2021 
Blown Glass 
51 cm 

Anna Pajak  Det Är Det Som Är Döden, 2021 

Anna Pajak 
Det Är Det Som Är Döden, 2021 
Oil on Canvas 
160 x 140 cm / 62 x 55 in

Anna Pajak Dödsdans, 2021 

Anna Pajak
Dödsdans, 2021 
Oil on Canvas 
160 x 140 cm / 62 x 55 in

Anna Pajak Förstenad, 2021 

Anna Pajak
Förstenad, 2021 
Oil on Canvas 
160 x 140 cm / 62 x 55 in 

Anna Pajak  Försvunnen, 2021 

Anna Pajak 
Försvunnen, 2021 
Oil on Canvas 
96 x 96 cm / 37 x 37 in 

Anna Pajak Havet Hör Mig, 2021 

Anna Pajak
Havet Hör Mig, 2021 
Oil on Canvas 
160 x 140 cm / 62 x 55 in

Anna Pajak  Svärd, 2021 

Anna Pajak 
Svärd, 2021 
Blown Glass 
59 cm 

Anna Pajak Jag Ser Henne, 2021

Anna Pajak
Jag Ser Henne, 2021
Oil on Canvas 
180 x 180 cm / 71 x 71 in 

Anna Pajak Klang, 2021 

Anna Pajak
Klang, 2021 
Oil on Canvas 
66 x 66 cm / 25 x 25 in 

Anna Pajak  Sköld, 2021 

Anna Pajak 
Sköld, 2021 
Oil on Canvas 
180 x 180 cm / 71 x 71 in 

Anna Pajak  Svärd, 2021 

Anna Pajak 
Svärd, 2021 
Blown Glass 
45 cm 

Anna Pajak  Trollbunden, 2021 

Anna Pajak 
Trollbunden, 2021 
Oil on Canvas 
96 x 96 cm / 37 x 37 in

Installation view, Medusas Skratt, 2022

Installation view, Medusas Skratt, 2022
Photo Jean-Baptiste Béranger

Installation view, Medusas Skratt, 2022

Installation view, Medusas Skratt, 2022
Photo Jean-Baptiste Béranger

Installation view, Medusas Skratt

Installation view, Medusas Skratt, 2022
Photo Jean-Baptiste Béranger

Installation view, Medusas Skratt, 2022

Installation view, Medusas Skratt, 2022
Photo Jean-Baptiste Béranger

Installation view, Medusas Skratt, 2022

Installation view, Medusas Skratt, 2022
Photo Jean-Baptiste Béranger

Installation view, Medusas Skratt, 2022

Installation view, Medusas Skratt, 2022
Photo Jean-Baptiste Béranger

Installation view, Medusas Skratt, 2022

Installation view, Medusas Skratt, 2022
Photo Jean-Baptiste Béranger

Installation view, Medusas Skratt, 2022

Installation view, Medusas Skratt, 2022
Photo Jean-Baptiste Béranger

Installation view, Medusas Skratt, 2022

Installation view, Medusas Skratt, 2022
Photo Jean-Baptiste Béranger

Installation view, Medusas Skratt, 2022

Installation view, Medusas Skratt, 2022
Photo Jean-Baptiste Béranger

Installation view, Medusas Skratt, 2022

Installation view, Medusas Skratt, 2022
Photo Jean-Baptiste Béranger

Installation view, Medusas Skratt, 2022

Installation view, Medusas Skratt, 2022
Photo Jean-Baptiste Béranger

Installation view, Medusas Skratt, 2022

Installation view, Medusas Skratt, 2022
Photo Jean-Baptiste Béranger

Installation view, Medusas Skratt, 2022

Installation view, Medusas Skratt, 2022
Photo Jean-Baptiste Béranger

Installation view, Medusas Skratt, 2022

Installation view, Medusas Skratt, 2022
Photo Jean-Baptiste Béranger

Installation view, Medusas Skratt, 2022

Installation view, Medusas Skratt, 2022
Photo Jean-Baptiste Béranger

Installation view, Medusas Skratt, 2022

Installation view, Medusas Skratt, 2022
Photo Jean-Baptiste Béranger

About

We are pleased to present Anna Pajak’s second solo exhibition at the gallery, Medusas Skratt (The Laugh of the Medusa). Besides the new series of oil painting, several set in a monumental scale, the exhibition features glass sculptures, a new medium for Pajak. Opening Reception will take place on Thursday, February 10 from 4 - 7 pm. 

With an exquisite sense of color and precise compositions, Anna Pajak creates intuitive motifs reminiscent of sacred geometry and religious icons. With a starting point in the myth of the Medusa, Anna Pajak invites us to a seductive and powerful imagery filled with mysterious symbolism. When Medusa dies, the warrior Chrysaor and the winged horse Pegasus are born out of her blood when mixed with the sea foam. Medusa is murdered, but instead two powerful creatures emerge, a metaphor Anna Pajak has been inspired by. The paintings in the exhibition are intended as Medusa's shields. Seductive objects such as precious stones and flowers are composed together with geometric elements in a vibrant, clear color scheme. Motifs reminiscent of the unicorn Pegasus horn are found in several of the paintings but are also represented in three-dimensional form as a group of glass sculptures. Anna Pajak's paintings vibrates, as if charged with an inherent energy.

Pajaks often work in dialogue with female pioneers, writers and artists. In her first solo exhibition at Wetterling Gallery, Ghost Flowers Arrive Through Water, she invited Georgia O'Keeffe into her process; her degree exhibition from the Royal Institute of Arts took place in relation to Hilma af Klint's work. The title of the exhibition Medusas Skratt (The Laugh of the Medusa) is borrowed from Hélène Cixou's feminist classic from 1975.

“I read Hélène Cixous' essay The laugh of the Medusa. I feel directly interested in how I can transfer her theory of female writing to my language of painting. The writing is cyclical and non-linear like the female body, just like painting, I think. According to Cixous, what distinguishes female writing, is that it gives expression to the body, or that the language captures what the body has experienced, just like painting. For me, a narrative emerges in parallel with the paintings, the stories can be abstract, they point to a state. There, in the painting, I get to know the characters / symbols, and in me with them, a new story is created. I have invited Medusa's companionship to the studio and together we have let her shields grow. The snakes that form her hair must stand for her different desire, for the diversity of the woman being. There are no dichotomies, in my exhibition Medusa's Laughter, everything must exist at the same time. I meet Medusa's gaze in the studio, do not get petrified. In her iris shines a gradient sky, vulgarly beautiful. I see the exhibition as her return. Violent and soft at the same time.”

- Anna Pajak, 2022

As an extension of the exhibition Wetterling Gallery has published an exhibition catalogue featuring a text by Magdalena Ljung, art journalist and writer.

Anna Pajak, born 1992, lives and works in Stockholm. She graduated with a Master of Fine Arts from The Royal Institute of Art, Stockholm in 2020. Anna Pajak has been exhibited at Kunstverket Galleri, Oslo, Konsthallen Kvarnen, Dalarna, and Stene Projects, Stockholm to name a few. She has been rewarded with grants from Queen Sonja Printmaking Award (2021) and Royal Swedish Academy of Fine Arts (2019 and 2020) among others.