Andreas Emenius, Myrtle Avenue, 2019. Price $42,500. PHILLIPS X Andreas Emenius.
Intertwining the mundane realities of every day with classical and elusive forms, Andreas Emenius interprets the world as it is observed and how it is perceived. Presented in collaboration with PHILLIPS X and SHIN GALLERY, this season’s private selling exhibition examines both early works depicting groups of individuals, alongside new work reflecting abstracted landscapes. With the intention to balance composition, color, and line, Emenius oscillates between the banal and otherworldly to capture a specific moment in time. Here, we sit down with both artist and gallerist to explore the history, practice and inspiration behind Emenius’ work on offer in the exhibition.
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PHILLIPS: To start with, Shin, how did you discover Andreas?
HONG GYU SHIN: It was about four or five years ago. We have a mutual friend who teaches at the Royal Academy of Art in Copenhagen. She showed me Andreas’ works, and I wanted to see them in person. I visited Andreas’ studio, and I just fell in love with his works.
P: What did you see in Andreas’ works that propelled you to support his career as both a gallerist and a collector?
HGS: I found it had quite a unique approach. When you see European or Western painters, they tend to fill the canvas out a lot, but with Andreas, he really emphasizes simplicity. He focuses on each line—it’s not intentional, but very spontaneous. He showed me a lot of large paintings on raw or white canvas. If it's a figurative painting, artists can always go back and fix minor mistakes. They can change the composition, things like that. But with Andreas, it's just very simple, poetic, and gestural. I saw that he had reached a certain level for him to accomplish that kind of style, the use of colors, everything was really there. But I also felt that if I were to support him more, he would be able to have a real breakthrough, which is where he is at right now. That's why when I first met with him, I asked if he wanted to come and work in New York. He flew to New York within a few weeks, and that's how our relationship really started.
Andreas Emenius, 4th of July Barbecue. Price $42,500. PHILLIPS X Andreas Emenius.
P: Andreas, can you explain the process behind your practice?
ANDREAS EMENIUS: My interest is very much in that rhythmical intensity—the balance between something spontaneous and direct, and knowing when to stop. It's not only spontaneous; there's always quite a clear thought to begin with about what I want out of the painting. It's never going to end up there, of course, it's not abstract expressionism where anything works. It's a clear idea of a person, situation, or a certain memory from nature. But I really like that it has a sense of intensity, and directness and almost like a fastness. I want to go quite quick, so you don't overthink it. The brain, sometimes, because we are brought up, it’s logic prevents you from doing things. So, that's important to me. In general, practice-wise it's a kind of romantic stance in whatever I experience in my life. The subject matters are usually people I meet, places I've been to, memories and such. And that's also mixed together with a lot of images I happen to stumble upon. For example, I might take a still from a film I might see in the evening. And obviously, everything is filtered quite heavily through art history, which is where we all come from, I suppose.
I'll be happy if a viewer comes into an exhibition, and they can't really walk past the painting.
P: How would you like the viewer to react to your work?
AE: Yeah, that's a good question. The main goal is basic communication. You want to communicate something, right? And it's true that images say things that can be difficult to put into words. I'll be happy if a viewer comes into an exhibition, and they can't really walk past the painting. They may not like it even, or they might like it, but I like it to have some kind of physical effect or presence in the room, so the viewer stops and perhaps are a little bit more aware of what they feel at that point.
P: Why is painting an essential part of your art making?
AE: My artmaking is quite broad, medium-wise. It's painting, drawings, films, performance, sculpture. It's an entire universe, as opposed to how works are usually exhibited as an installation—even with sound. However, at the epicenter of that is painting and drawing. Everything comes from there. And for me, that's the most direct means of expression in whatever ideas I have, the points usually come in different packages. They might be groups of people, or they might be nature. I always start expressing those ideas in images and paintings. And from there, I like to expand it and bring in other means of communication. So, a sculpture might talk to a painting. I've had what would be called living sculptures, where I have performers and actors in the room who wear painted outfits that are drawn from the paintings. It all starts from those flat surfaces, and I just like to expand them these days because it seems more in tune with our times.
P: In the exhibition, there is both early work with groups of people and there's newer work with focus on landscape. Can you tell us maybe about both bodies of work? And if so, are they interconnected in some way?
AE: They interconnect in the sense that I am the one creating them, so there are things that are always going to hopefully be a signature of mine. I want to pick up a little bit on what Shin was saying about meeting in Copenhagen and coming to New York. I've been to New York many times, and even I lived here a little bit when I was younger, but at the same time it was really a new period of my life. Those works were very much about groups of people I happened to see when I was looking around the city—mixed with memories from a lot of people I grew up with. And so there was a mixture of those kind of images, and they came to be about a lot of people in groups. Some of these are more figurative, and then some are more abstract, and I always tend to work in that spectrum. For me, that's not a contradiction, that's actually working together. They talk to each other somehow. How far into abstraction can you go while still having a sense of the person or subject and vice versa? That evolved into later works, which are much more about nature.
And I guess the obvious part of the answer is the last year where everyone's been a bit off the grid. I spent some time around Lake Michigan, which had a great effect on me. They sometimes call the area little Sweden. When I was younger, I spent a lot of time in the northern part of Sweden, and those two worlds kind of mixed together again. It felt a bit poignant. There was a sense of urgency around the nature. The raw almost violent part of nature, something archaic, that had an appeal to me.
Andreas Emenius, Friend in Need, 2020. Price $47,500. PHILLIPS X Andreas Emenius.
P: Shin, you and Andreas have a very close relationship. How has he evolved as an artist and as a person, in your opinion?
HGS: When we first met, we both were single, and now Andreas has his first son, and I have a girlfriend, so our lives have changed a lot in a personal sense. Mondays and Tuesdays are my days off, and Andreas and I always get lunch or dinner together in Chinatown. We always dream so many things, and we share all these dreams because we both know that dreaming big and dreaming expensive is free. It’s always so fun to share our true passions together. I think every year we are really getting closer to our dreams, and I am really proud of Andreas. It's not like his works get more mature or better. No, each period is completely different. When he first arrived in New York, he was focused on what he saw on the street, so that was one series. Then during COVID, he moved to Lake Michigan and started creating these beautiful landscapes. It's very interesting to see how artists can react to their surroundings.
We share all these dreams because we both know that dreaming big and dreaming expensive is free.
Even recently, we made a day trip to upstate New York where I'm planning to build a museum, and there is a beautiful landscape that I think Andreas was really inspired by. He started making these landscape paintings in a completely colorful and energetic way. I think his artworks have always had a very personal and intimate energy. At same time, each period really represents his story quite well: his surroundings and what he's been influenced by. Getting that idea takes time but making artwork doesn't take much time. So it's been really a great pleasure and honor that I was able to see all the different styles of his paintings past for four and a half years.
AE: I think it's always better to work with an intimate relationship, so to speak. And I think it's evident in the way Shin talks about it. For example, that day trip I remember very well. We had a chance to talk and then see the landscape and when I came back, I felt very hungry to paint, it really affected me. At that time, it was a lot about these landscapes and, and there's a certain energy that I can't let go of in any other way than to paint. I think sometimes galleries find it hard to put that into words, maybe because they don't understand, but one of the strengths with Shin is that he does understand it very well. And he can see it from an objective point of view.
Andreas Emenius, Lakeside, 2021. Price $8,125. PHILLIPS X Andreas Emenius.
I think that's also because he can see from not just a European or American but also global perspective. It’s been really beneficial for me that there's this higher ceiling here in what art can be; in what I could be. SHIN GALLERY has always been very supportive and believed in me.
I have always been inspired by people in history that produced a lot of work and fast, like Picasso or Basquiat. I think that's evident of a state of freedom. When things are good, that's how you feel, you just want to keep on producing. And I think a gallery such as SHIN GALLERY is so important because it provides a certain framework that enables that, together with the studio. Like Shin was saying, you walk around trying to figure out the next ideas or what you're fascinated by. But when it comes to the production of the work, I think the faster it goes, that's a good sign.
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