Lot 31: ELINA BROTHERUS (b.1972 Finnish)

ELINA BROTHERUS (b.1972 Finnish)
Le Printemps from 'The New Painting', 2001
chromogenic print
signed, titled, dated and numbered '4/6' in ink on backing board
27 x 31in. (68.5 x 78.6cm.)

Lund, Sweden, Lunds Konsthall, Elina Brotherus, January 2002; Vasteras, Sweden, Vasteras Art Museum, Elina Brotherus, April 2002; Hämeenlinna, Finland, Hämeenlinna Art Museum, Elina Brotherus, 25 May -- 15 June 2002.

Decisive Days -- Elina Brotherus: Photographs 1997-2001, Pohjoinen, 2002, front cover & p.95 (fig.1); Bankale (ed.), Elina Brotherus: The New Painting, Next Level & Creative Space, 2005, p.17; Grosenick & Seeling (eds.), Photo Art: Fotografie Im 21.Jahrhundert, DuMont, 2007, p.89; Artist File 2008: The NACT Annual Show of Contemporary Art/File 001: Elina Brotherus, The National Art Center, Tokyo, 2008, p.18.

I am interested in classical subject matters and pay a lot of attention to light, colour, composition, representation of the human figure and the space -- things that I consider fundamental in all visual art.

ELINA BROTHERUS, 2005

DISTINCTIVELY NORDIC
No VAT will be charged on the hammer price, but VAT at 17.5% will be added to the buyer's premium which is invoiced on a VAT inclusive basis.
Artist's Resale Right ("droit de Suite"). If the Artist's Resale Right Regulations 2006 apply to this lot, the buyer also agrees to pay us an amount equal to the resale royalty provided for in those Regulations, and we undertake to the buyer to pay such amount to the artist's collection agent.
This work is number 4 from the sold-out edition of 6.

Her series The New Painting, 2000-04, marked a transition from an autobiographical to a formal approach. Brotherus explains, 'Up to 1999, I focused on emotions and was looking for emotional "decisive moments", something personal but at the same time recognizable to all, "the human condition". Then, with The New Painting, there was a profound shift: the formal, visual qualities became the primary subject matter. My role in the image is that of a model, all personal narration is ruled out.' (quoted in The New Painting, p.71)

Brotherus earned her MA in Photography from the University of Art and Design Helsinki. Her works have been included in dozens of shows, including a solo show this spring at The National Art Center, Tokyo; a two-year travelling exhibition for her series The New Painting, organized by The Finnish Museum of Photography; and, most recently, Nordic Moods -- Landscape Photography of Our Time at ARKEN Museum of Modern Art, Denmark. Her photographs are in numerous private, corporate and institutional collections, including the Saatchi Collection, London; The Corcoran Gallery, Washington D.C.; DZ Bank, Germany; and Musée de l'Elysée, Lausanne. In 2002 she was shortlisted for the Deutsche Börse Photography Prize. Brotherus lives and works in Finland and France.