Galerie Maria Wettergren is delighted to present the solo exhibition Torrent, featuring a selection of important sculptures by the Norwegian artist Hanne Friis. Several of these works were shown in her solo exhibition, Circulation, at the Vigeland Museum in Oslo in 2022-2023. Hanne Friis (b. 1972) is known for her monumental textile sculptures, shaped through a folding and sewing technique carried out by hand. Dense layers of folded fabrics transform the loose material into a compressed mass and sculptural form. The sculptural forms are abstract, with references to the body and nature. The exhibition title refers to movement, fluids, force and transformation, central to Friis’ work.

Some forms hang from the ceiling, others are placed on the floor. Soft textile sculptures in viscose, skaï and vinyl with dense layers of folded materials, tightly hand-stitched by the artist, transforming the fabric into a compressed mass and sculptural form. In places, the material bursts out of the body of the work, like small eruptions of organic growth. The abstract forms of Friis’ works make reference to cycles of nature as well as bodily processes. Indeed, there is something animistic about the forms that she creates, as though they are inhabited by souls, weighed down by folds of skin, all the while flourishing with life. Friis does not imitate the laws and biological systems of nature, but instead seems to touch on its primal forms in a wild yet controlled, expressive interpretation. A small selection of drawings made during the artist’s residency at the Cité des Arts in Paris, 2021, as well as the concrete sculpture, Imprint III, complete the exhibition and show a larger spectrum of Friis’ fascinating universe.