Water world

Norwegian exhibit reminiscent of past exhibitions

Is art inseparable from its source? Would a Norwegian exhibition “look” Norwegian? For Between Time and Space: Contemporary Norwegian Sculpture and Installation, the answer is “yes.” There’s water, water everywhere in the Atlanta Contemporary Art Center show curated by the center’s former director, Louise Shaw. It’s not just the drought that makes the cool-toned show appear like a mirage. Four of the six artists’ works contain literal and spiritual references to water and boats. The other two use materials that boats are made of; their silvery surfaces allude to modern seafaring vessels.

Bard Breivik writes familiar poetry with 25 20-inch canoe shapes mounted along one wall. Woven or solid, their brown, gray and black shapes evoke the universal vocabulary of womb, net, mask and basket. On his travels, the artist has collected almost 200 of these boats from craftspeople of other cultures.

Bente Stokke presents an installation of photographs and drawings to document her ongoing series, “The Ship.” The appeal in this subtle work lies in Stokke’s ability to create a motion-filled narrative from 140 flat squares of blue and gray imagery. Still, the two-dimensional installation lacks the dynamism of her performance and sculpture. “The Crossing,” her wall-sized video, simply records a ferry boat passage between Denmark and Sweden. Its abstract, impressionist storytelling offers sensory refreshment.

Per Barclay also displays only documents of his installation work from a 1990 Artforum commission. As he flooded an Italian palace, a Greek church and an old Norwegian boathouse with used motor oil, Barclay examined the contradictions in toxic beauty. His gorgeous large-scale, gleaming prints might remind some viewers of the more visceral treatment of oil in an Atlanta exhibition two years ago. In Space 1181, when Polish artist Monika Weiss placed a bubbling font of oil at the edge of Koiman, she set the stage for an unsettling theater of toxic ritual.

Certain of Gunnar Torvund’s small-scale surreal assemblages resemble those by former Atlantan Todd Murphy seen in a recent exhibition at the High Museum. Both fuse and mystify multiple cultural iconographies. In “Self Portrait on a Sleigh,” a head lies on a leaden sled, while in “Torture,” a figure is bound on a flat metal bed.

Kristin Ytreberg, an architect-become-artist, works to subvert her materials. She domesticates lead by twisting and swaging it, “embroiders” a metal screen with metal filament, makes a chair from fragments of cast iron and weaves a crystal tablecloth. Her assemblages parallel some of the found-object constructions made by our Southern outsiders and by fine artists like Atlantan Kendall Carter.

Per Inge Bjorlo’s thick-limbed welded objects — half-creature, half-space ship — intend to represent psychological metaphors. Their anthropomorphic forms share sensibilities with recent skinny-legged archetypal sculptures by Atlanta artist David Isenhour, whose work is on view in Coming Attractions at Vaknin Schwartz through August.

Perhaps the most evident connection to be made in Between Time and Space is that these days, no matter where they come from, contemporary artists are exposed to the same planet of pathos and possibilities. This beautifully executed exhibition is meant to represent Norway. And so it does. Yet the well made works miss an opportunity to introduce us to more adventurous artmaking from across the sea.

Between Time and Space: Contemporary Norwegian Sculpture and Installation continues through Aug. 19 at the Atlanta Contemporary Arts Center, 535 Means St. A panel discussion titled “Is Sculpture Dead?” will be held Aug. 3 at 7 p.m. 404-688-1970.