- Art ServedProject Featured On:Art Served — 5/31/12
The Charlatan Mind
Description
LELLO//ARNELL's photographic collage The Chief Executive Meditation Piece (After Desmond Morris) stems from a painting by the British zoologist and artist Desmond Morris. This painting featured on the cover of the first edition of Richard Dawkins' The Selfish Gene, a book which Jeffrey Skilling, the director of Enron, counted amongst his favourites. The latter misinterpreted the book as asserting that humans survive by a genetic strengthening of their instinct for greed and competition, which makes it difficult to believe that he ever really read it. With evolutionary business foresight, he formed a committee that drew up an annual evaluation of the employees and fired the 15% worst of them.
The photographic collage mirrors Morris' composition through its use of potted plants, desk lamps and carpets, culminating in a talisman-like object whose purpose is to impart sublime wisdom and understanding for business operations. The work sets the agenda for a particular kind of logic that permeates the exhibition and portrays reality as a malleable mass that can be kneaded into whatever you like – or do not like.
The Charlatan Mind springs from ideas about the individual as alienated and outcast, who, due to loss of contact with his surroundings, falls back on an alternative perception of reality and embraces this so strongly that his alienation becomes self-perpetuating. The exhibition, consisting of a small number of large two- and three-dimensional works, is put together as a narrative about a diffuse individual and can be interpreted as a psychological portrait of this individual and his mental decay.
The photographic collage mirrors Morris' composition through its use of potted plants, desk lamps and carpets, culminating in a talisman-like object whose purpose is to impart sublime wisdom and understanding for business operations. The work sets the agenda for a particular kind of logic that permeates the exhibition and portrays reality as a malleable mass that can be kneaded into whatever you like – or do not like.
The Charlatan Mind springs from ideas about the individual as alienated and outcast, who, due to loss of contact with his surroundings, falls back on an alternative perception of reality and embraces this so strongly that his alienation becomes self-perpetuating. The exhibition, consisting of a small number of large two- and three-dimensional works, is put together as a narrative about a diffuse individual and can be interpreted as a psychological portrait of this individual and his mental decay.
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Art Served
Installation view, The Charlatan Mind, Galleri Erik Steen, 07 April - 15 May 2011- LELLO//ARNELL
Jørgen Craig Lello & Tobias Arnell
THE CHARLATAN MIND
Galleri Erik Steen
07 April - 15 May 2011 - LELLO//ARNELL's photographic collage The Chief Executive Meditation Piece (After Desmond Morris) stems from a painting by the British zoologist and artist Desmond Morris. This painting featured on the cover of the first edition of Richard Dawkins' The Selfish Gene, a book which Jeffrey Skilling, the director of Enron, counted amongst his favourites. The latter misinterpreted the book as asserting that humans survive by a genetic strengthening of their instinct for greed and competition, which makes it difficult to believe that he ever really read it. With evolutionary business foresight, he formed a committee that drew up an annual evaluation of the employees and fired the 15% worst of them.
The photographic collage mirrors Morris' composition through its use of potted plants, desk lamps and carpets, culminating in a talisman-like object whose purpose is to impart sublime wisdom and understanding for business operations. The work sets the agenda for a particular kind of logic that permeates the exhibition and portrays reality as a malleable mass that can be kneaded into whatever you like – or do not like.
The Charlatan Mind springs from ideas about the individual as alienated and outcast, who, due to loss of contact with his surroundings, falls back on an alternative perception of reality and embraces this so strongly that his alienation becomes self-perpetuating. The exhibition, consisting of a small number of large two- and three-dimensional works, is put together as a narrative about a diffuse individual and can be interpreted as a psychological portrait of this individual and his mental decay. 
Hercules Slaying the Hydra (2011)
Powder-coated steel and aluminium, 350cm x 300cm x 250cm
Reflections on Corporate Efficiency, the Modernist Movement and Human Evolution (After Congo the Chimpanzee) (2011)
Acrylic on canvas, 200cm x 266cm
Chief Executive Meditation Piece (After Desmond Morris) (2011)
Digital print on aluminium, 190cm x 124cm
Installation view, The Charlatan Mind, Galleri Erik Steen, 07 April - 15 May 2011- Yin and Yang: The Struggle Towards Balance and Harmony (2011)
Acrylic on MDF, Ø120cm - Those Eyes; They Follow Me (2011)
Acrylic on carpet, 200cm x 150cm - ...I found myself, depleted, on my hands and knees, sweat pouring, my head spinning. Beside me, a bottle of Sprite, horribly mangled but intact. I slowly unscrewed it, took a large gulp and instantly vomited. I knew it would happen - I knew what I needed to do: My Spirit Guide had foreseen all of this... (2011)
Fingerpainted chair, 81cm x 46,5cm x 55cm - Transparent Friendship (2011)
Glass, Ø105cm - The Protagonist Gazing into His Own Reflection (2011)
Mirrors and MDF, 200cm x 150cm - Installation view, The Charlatan Mind, Galleri Erik Steen, 07 April - 15 May 2011
- The artist duo LELLO//ARNELL consists of Jørgen Craig Lello (born 1978 in Fredrikstad) and Tobias Arnell (born 1978 in Lund). Recent solo exhibitions include Transmission, Galerie Susan Nielsen in Paris (2010); LELLO//ARNELL, Aalesund Art Association (2010); The New Ritual, Akershus Art Centre (2010); The Great Migration, Christianssand Art Association (2009) and Revision, Galleri 21 in Malmö (2009). Additionally their works have been included in exhibitions as the 28th Biennial of Graphic Art, MGLC in Ljubljana (2009), Rock-Paper-Scissors, Galerie Susan Nielsen in Paris (2009); Mutual: On Collaboration at Samson Projects, Boston (2008); International Call, Luis Adelantado Gallery in Valencia (2008) and Lights On – Norwegian Contemporary Art, Astrup Fearnley Museum for Modern Art in Oslo (2008).
Visuals of LELLO//ARNELL's works are available on request. For more information, please contact Erik Steen or Nina Paus, telephone +47 22 55 09 54, or visit our website
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