Troels Carlsen Art

Over the last two decades, Troels Carlsen has developed a painting practice, in which canonical art historical subjects are transferred to otherworldly realms. Paintings beyond dreams with intentions too deliberate to be labeled Surrealist. His work incorporates nineteenth-century anatomical drawings into the world of his painting, resulting in visceral assemblages of hybrid figures. Carlsen’s archival impulses which connect such seemingly disparate references spring from a nearly forensic interest in how images are made, and how our understanding of the world is constituted by images in a symbolic as well as a literal, bodily sense. Carlsen’s interest in image creation explores how we recognize- and idealize both ourselves and others with romantic introspection.