FANNY HELLGREN

The work of Fanny Hellgren (b.1992, Gothenburg, Sweden) deals with ideas of time, change, and ephemerality in relation to natural and constructed landscapes. She works in series of abstractions and has over the years oscillated between painting, drawing, sculpture, and installation. Using materials such as sand, stone, water, resin, concrete, pigment, graphite, and paper, the properties and agency of the materials guides her process based practice. In Hellgren’s work, natural science and mysticism merges and reflects on the connection between the micro and the macro, the cycles of nature, and the meaning-seeking nature of humans. 

Hellgren’s new series of sculptures out of sand, resin, and pigments are islands of desert land - alienated from each other. They reflect on in the human impulse to search for meaning, and how the sensation of purpose is dependent on the feeling of connection to the world around us, other humans, and nature. The sculptures are physical objects in the room but at the same time they appear distant - they act as windows towards space or places beyond the room. People react differently when thinking of the endless universe. Some people feel a comfort and fascination, whereas others think it’s terrifying to reflect on their own smallness. In the same way, these sculptures may appear as desert, cold, and lonely places, or as a calm refuge from which we can get a perspective and distance from a chaotic world. 

Hellgren holds an MFA from the Malmö Art Academy (2021), a BFA from HDK-Valand in Gothenburg (2017) and has studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna (2016). She has exhibited at venues such as Göteborgs Konsthall (2023), NEVVEN (Gothenburg, 2024 and 2020), Kulturföreningen Lyktan (Gothenburg, 2022), 3:e Våningen (Gothenburg, 2019), KC Magacin (Belgrade, 2019), Raum Vollreinigung (Berlin, 2018), Gothenburg City Museum (2015), and Alingsås Museum (2015), and her work is represented in public collections including Statens Konstråd, Ståhl Collection, Region Kalmar and Region Skåne, to name a few. Hellgren lives and works in Gothenburg, Sweden.