And so it goes...

Henrik Saar

BIO:
Name: Henrik Saar
Born: 1967, Soenderborg, Denmark
Address: Bajonetten 12 st. tv. 7000 Fredericia, Denmark
Phone: 45+27922560
Email: henriksaar@gmail.com
Web: http://www.henriksaar.dk

Civil Status:
Henrik Saar was married 17 years with a woman from Peru and has got two kids. Now he lives alone with his art.

Profession:
Artist (painting, drawings, graphics and poems)

Education:
Teacher - special studies in art and religion - Graduated in Haderslev Teachers college1999
Free studies in the Academy of Fine Arts in Lima, Peru during years in longer journeys and living in Peru 1995, 98, 2000, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2008
Prefer medium: Painting with oil and drawing with ink, ballpoint, pencil, charcoal and linocut.
While Henrik Saar was only a boy and later on a young man his father was a practicing architect with his own company. It was Obvious that Henrik Saar should study architecture with the purpose to continue the company: ”Drawing office of Saar”, but during 7 years in the company doing practice and copying the drawings of the architects, it also became pretty obvious, that architecture only had his attention in the drawings and not in the buildings. So he refused to study architecture, and every time he tried to do something reasonable, he ended up with his drawings and happy melancholy loneliness. Until one lucky night 20 years ago, he woke up after a dream with a conviction that without doubt told him to leave everything behind in order to realize his inner passion for the art. And so he did, and has been 100% artist ever since with all pain and all satisfaction it gives.

Art style:
Contemporary art inspired by the old Italian masters with a South-American flavour and existential aesthetics driven by despair and inner anxiety.
Subject: The existentialism – The human being searching for itself in the confusing space between common life, belief and spirituality.
Expression: Trying to let the colour become as deep, pure and shiny as the figures are reliable in his paintings without turning out as realism. It is an inner vision that must find its reality in the visual articulation.

Scholarship:
1994: One year support to work with art from the Municipality of Fredericia, Denmark. Title:”Do the wings bear!”

Represented in Books:
1994:” Danish Art, Yearbook 1994” - Copenhagen, Denmark
2008:”Who is Who in Visual Art 2008 - 2009”, Art Domain, Leipzig, Germany -
A book promoting 100 promising contemporary artists I Europe right now.
2009:”101 Danish Artists 2009” Copenhagen, Denmark -
A book promoting 101 promising contemporary Artists in Denmark right now.

Represented in Radio- and Television-shows:
”A stranger in the World” Exhibition, poems and music. Together with the Kurdish music-composer Amanj Zarafian - Television Copenhagen 2002, Denmark
” Passion and Suffer” Radio profile - interview - Radio Symfonica, Lima, Peru 2003
”Danish Artist working together with the Kurdish refugees” - Live painting - Halabja in the Axeltorv of Copenhagen, Television Copenhagen, Denmark 2007
”Who is Henrik Saar” Uncut film from the Artist-community”Lumpenhaus” -
Berlin, Germany 2008.
”Henrik Saar in Gallery Bastillen” Television Copenhagen 2008, Denmark

Special exhibition:
2003: Retrospective exhibition - Theme:”Passion and suffer”
59 paintings in the Centre of Culture of The Fine Arts Academy of Lima in Peru.

Participating in Awards:
2006: P.p. with 4 paintings in the Multi-Art Exhibit. Fredericia, Denmark -2. place
2007: P.p. with 3 paintings in the Palm Art Award, Leipzig, Germany - 3. place
2009: P.p. with 4 paintings in Art for Everyone, Fredericia, Denmark - 2. Place
2009: Pp. in The exhibit. ”The Municipality, Frederiksvaerk, Denmark - 2. Place

SPECIAL MEMBERSHIPS:
2007: Member of Art Domain, Leipzig - Germany
2007: Member of Berlinout, The Danish Ministry of Culture. - Germany
2009: Member of World Art Foundation - USA
2009: Member of L`opera Celeste - Art-Stars - Italy

Some of my further exhibitions:
1993: Ordrupgaard, Ballerup Art-Association, Ballerup, Denmark.
1994: Gallery Rugholm, Fredericia, Denmark.
1994: Gallery Asbæk/Stærk, Horsens, Denmark.
1997: Gallery Esfelt, Horsens, Denmark
1997: Gallery Fillip, Horsens, Denmark
1998: Exhibition, poetry and music on the bridge of the beach in Fredericia, Denmark. Together with the Kurdish music-composer Amanj Zarafian.
1998: Dancing picture in a classic concert for children, Fredericia theatre, Denmark. Together with the Kurdish music-composer Amanj Zarafian.
1999: Det Brunske pakhus, Fredericia. “The voice in the dark” Inhabitation, poetry and music. Together with the Kurdish music- composer Amanj Zarafian.
1999: Artscool and exhibition with children in the art-museum Trapholt, Denmark
2004: The Art-Association Filosofgangen, Odense, Denmark. Theme: “Out of time” Together with the Artist Hans Christian Hauge Rasmussen
2004: Gallery Esfelt, Horsens, Denmark.
2004: Gallery Fillip, Horsens, Denmark.
2005: Centre of Culture INC, Piura, Peru.
Together with the Association De Artes plasticas “Felipe Cossio Del Pomar”
2006: Gallery Nordstjernen, Fredericia, Denmark.
2007: Christmas-exhibition in BMB Gallery, Copenhagen, Denmark
2007: Performance in "The Meeting-place" Together with the Kurdish
music-composer Amanj Zarafian
2008: Exhibition in "Das Kunstwerk” Together with the artist-community "Lumpenhaus", Potsdam, Berlin, Germany.
2008: Gallery Bastillen : Paintings, Copenhagen, Denmark
2008: Gallery Bastillen: Drawings, Copenhagen, Denmark
2009: Gallery The Danish art-café, Berlin, Germany

Works sold to public institutions:
Ballerup Art-Association: "Standing position", painting.
Carlsberg / Tuborg Brewery: "My father", The drawing.
"The Working man", drawing.
”The apple, Painting.”
Horsens Folkeblad: "My Peruvian wife", painting.

Some Of my Professors
1981 - 88: Horst Saar: Architecture, drawing, reproduction and graphic, Denmark.
1985 - 87: Svend Riis: Drawing, Fredericia, Denmark.
1988 – 90: Teachers` College, Toender, Denmark.
1988 - 90: Erik Guldager: Painting, drawing, graphic, ceramics, Toender, Denmark.
1991 - 95: Håkaan Nystrøm: Painting, Copenhagen, Denmark
1990 - 01: Poul Skovbo: Materials and chemicals in painting, Copenhagen, Denmark.
1995 – 99: Teachers` College, Haderslev, Denmark.
1995 - 99: Birgitte Bækgaard: Religion and philosophy, Haderslev, Denmark.
1995: - 99: Leif Kath: Graphic, drawing and ceramic, Haderslev, Denmark.
1995: The Academy of Fine Arts: Painting, Lima, Peru
1998: The Academy of Fine Arts: Painting Lima, Peru.
2003 I teached as a professor in the Academy of Fine Arts in Lima, Peru and
Worked in my studio right beneath The Academy of Fine Arts, Lima, Peru

Symposiums and Conferences in Berlin, Germany:
2008: April - June: Symposium with German artist in the closed Paper-Factory.
2009: Symposium with German artists in the closed Paper-Factory, Hohenofen
2008: Conference in The House of the Cultures of the World - Theme: “Beyond Multiculturalism”
2009: Conference in The House of the Cultures of the World - Theme: “20 years after the wall”
2009: Conference in The Danish Embassy above the theme Viable architecture and participating in the pre-opening of Danish Architects exhibition to the environment-conference in Copenhagen dec. 2009
2009: Participating in gala party for active Danish artists in Berlin in the Danish Embassy.

Henrik Saar in the closed paper-factory outside Berlin, where he meets to work together with the artist group “LUMPENHAUS-COMMUNITY”. They are earlier East Germans and he is Danish. That makes an interesting cocktail with many good discussions across cultures.

Comment to the paintings from the lateast two years:
Theese paintings are from the last two years. A very compact time, where I lived in Copenhagen and traweled a lot to Berlin. In the same period I became a son and got separeted from my peruvian whife at almost the same time. Afterwards I worked a lot with my sexual identity. At the same time I made a poster for the kurdish people that had suffered in the willage "Halabja",, that Sadam Husain destroyed in a chemikal bombing. Short before that I had made a poster for a nurcestudients project "Getting older". I worked a while as teacher with prisoners and last participated in an awardexhibition with the theme "Municipality".
That the eksistencial manner of artwork, and that is, what I do: I paint all that, what I know unconciously, but can´t tell you in a few words. Mostly I paint, what come tomorrow. I work with the feeling about, what might come. So, I don´t understand my paintings completely in the moment of creating them. I haven´t got the gift of prophecy.


Comment to the more religious paintings:
Paintings from this album describe an inner struggle, that most artists working with spirituality will recognize as absurd questions about meaning.