Interview: David Risley

Graham Dolphin: In the Pines,

What is the history about your gallery? You had a place in London before moving here, right?

Yes, I had a gallery on Vyner Street in East End for about four years. Before that I worked as a curator, but I gave that up to represent artists in my own place.

How will the profile for the gallery in Copenhagen be? Will it be the exact same thing as you had in London?

I kind of want the place to tell me, instead of imposing too much on it. I'm very aware of being in a new context, and not just presenting a London gallery in Copenhagen. That just wouldn't fit. The programme, the way it works, and also just simple things like the times of the opening are so different. You can't just say: "This is what I do, here it is, whether you like it or not". Copenhagen, the gallery and the new situation is going to tell me what the profile is. But fundamentally, it's the same gallery.

There was a point where I had a big space and a big staff and I kind of hated it. I mean I loved it, but there's a point where it becomes an office with a gallery attached. I was so stucked in that office. The reason I opened a gallery in the first place was to show art, not to be in charge of staff or do business. Fundamentally this gallery will be the same gallery as before, but I want to concentrate more on exhibitions and less on representing. I'll keep representing the artists I work with, but not look into taking in more very quickly. I'm more interested in getting a programme. It's interesting for me to keep it fresh, keep it alive. Part of that is through moving.

The second show will be with Dexter Dalwood, and there's no way I could show him in London. He has shows at Gagosian in London, New York and LA, so moving here opens up a lot of doors in a strange way. It gives acess to artists. People, friends of mine, I couldn't show in London, I can show here. In London, New York or Berlin, they all have galleries. I hope to get new artists to Copenhagen. I just want to be more open, I suppose.

James Aldridge: Black Symmetry, 160 x 120 cm		James Aldridge: Hole in the Sky, 160 x 120 cm

Do you plan to adjust the profile of the gallery to make it fit into the local art scene?

Yes, in a way, but very gradually. It already has, to a larger extend, changed the way I'm going to do the exhibitions. Instead of having the artists I represent to do solo shows, which is how we usually do it, I want to put more energy into trying to get the artists I represent out in public - and then use the gallery programmes to be more flexible, to be more open.

In London I showed Mexican artists, Japanese artists, Swedish artists, Dutch artists - It wasn't all UK artists. So I don't see why that would be any different here. Here, I will show Japanese artists, Dutch artists, Swedish artists as well. At some point, I would like to show Danish artists, but I'm not going out to find Danish artists right away. I think it would be really patronising and quite false: I'm in Denmark, so I have to show Danish artists. I think it will happen more gradually, and that it will be a natural process to mix some of these works with something local.

John Stezaker: Bridge, 10 x 15 cm

How do you choose your artists?

Usually very slowly and through friendship. Getting to know their work. Getting to know them.

It's so much based on trust and mutual support, and the co-operation between an artist and the gallerist is a long term relationtionship. It's not just about their work, it's about them, about their person. It's a quite slow process. Like Bjerger: I have known for years and years, but it's only recently I have started to represent her.

Then, sometimes, like Eri Itoi, I went to her degree show and she was just fantastic, and then it happened quite spontaniously, quite quickly. But it's usually it's a quite slow process.

What do you look for?

Nothing specific. It's not like I look for a sculptor or I look for a painter. I just look for something that facinates me. A bit of heart or a very physical reaction. Something that intrigues me or confuses me, makes me want to see more.

You are opening up a gallery in a period in time where a lot of local galleries have either closed down or are very close to. Why did you choose to do this now?

If I didn't do it now, I would still have a gallery in London - and it would be the same there. That's what I do: I own a gallery where ever I am.

Times are really hard for everybody, let's not deny that. But I think for me it's more of a personal thing: I had been in London for a long time, the gallery got to a certain point and I had a baby. All kinds of things just made me, made us, want to move - change in lot's of things. It's about being in Copenhagen, it's not about whether it's a good thing or a bad thing for the business. The population of Denmark is half the population of London. The scale is so different - in a brilliant way. In London, all the big exhibitions go there, all the bands you ever want to se play there, but you never get to see any of them because it's too big. You finish work at seven, then it takes you an hour to get where ever the band is playing, and then you got a problem, because it's so difficult to get home again afterwards. Where as in Copenhagen you use the city more; you cycle around, you see more exhibitions and more events because it's more manageable.

Anthony Campuzano: Always flirt with death (study), 51 x 36 cm		Anthony Campuzano: Chorus, 71 x 38 cm

Could you introduce your first exhibition in the new gallery?

The first show is called In the Pines. It's also the title of a really old song. I traced it back to 1870 in America in the Appalachian Mountains. That's the basic version, but there is about a hundred and sixty variants of the lyrics, and thousands of versions of the actual song. The most basic version just goes:

My girl, my girl,

I shivered when the cold wind blows...

From that little root comes an enormous history. They think it was written originally in Britain before it traveled to America. It's got this weird otherness to it, this song. It's not black or white. The old country versions of it are just as prominent as those of the old blues singers. Dolly Parton's done it, Nirvana have done it. What's fascinating is that it has no author. No one knows where it comes from or when. It's almost like this thing, that came out of the forest, this song, because it's authorless. Artists rival to make it their own, singers rival to make it their own, and because nobody owns it, everyone can posess it - temporarily.

I picked the artists that fit that 'out of the forest'-idea. Carl Frederik Hill died in 1911. He was a Swedish quite traditionalist landscape painter. He worked and studied in Paris, then went back to Lund, where he had a breakdown. Then he got taken to Roskilde to mental hospital, was there for a while, went back to his family house looked after by his mom and his sister and made incredible works of art. They were never exibited, but luckily his sister saved them when he died. They are in Malmö Museum and The National Museum today. So that's kind of a historical thing. His work is very 'out of the forest', it holds a kind of darkness, and also he worked at the same time the song was written, which brings us back to the first historical link.

I first showed John Stezaker in a group show about ten years ago. He was head of theory at the Royal College of Art in London. He's just an incredibly influential artist around the younger generation. He works with collage and he works with images, found images. Graham Dolphin I went to college with. He's a really old friend, so that's a very personal link. And Charlie Woolley is a young artist I have been working with recently. Then there is work that I own, from my collection. It's this weird, beautiful drawning I found in a junkshop in Sweden. In that way it's almost like a song of an unknown author coming out of the forest.

The themes within the song are things that I'm really interested in. A lot of the art, that I'm interested in has to do with landscapes, time, mystery, otherness or darkness. The song is also about change and not knowing what's going on in a new situation. So in a way it's also about me.

Thank you.

Johan Thurfjell: Goodnight,		Johan Thurfjell: Goodnight,

Anthony Campuzano: He's alright, 51 x 56 cm.		Anna Bjerger: In the Pines, 50 x 60 cm.

Charlie Woolley: GJ Flag.		Wes Lang: Nature shit (Ernest Hemingway), 56 x 51 cm.

Eri Itoi: 1. mar09, 25 x 10 cm		Eri Itoi: 2. mar09, 25 x 10 cm