Visual artist working with Sculpture and drawing. Lives in Gothenburg, Sweden. Working in Gothenburg and Bohuslän. Born 1993 in Karlstad.
ruben_risholm@live.se
@rubenrisholm
2024
Review in Göteborgsposten
2023
Interview in Artnotes
2024
Podcast interview
2023
The human figure and face is something I return to. Humans become game pieces in a game where the rules are only partially known. At the same time, in their faces we meet ourselves or someone that occupies our mind. I believe that the human face can transfer information that escapes any language. The relation between life and the dead matter we arise from and once again will be reunited with fascinates me; in regard to ideas about how the world came to be, how it will end and how it is sustained, but also on a personal level.
The sculptural tradition of ancient Egypt where every object seems to serve an existential purpose is at the core of how I think about my work. The philosopher Emmanuel Levinas's idea of an infinite responsibility toward the other when we encounter their face accurately reflects the intention behind many of my sculptures of humans. I feel that this responsibility arises in the presence of many religious depictions, but most strongly through the frontality of the Egyptian sculptural tradition.
The idea that unconscious material exists in our souls that can be communicated through art, from one person to another, without it fully having been manifested consciously, is crucial to my art making. This is what makes me able to see an inner logic in my work, unlike that of the surrounding world. Through fairytales and myths that have propagated well into our own times, thin threads are woven between us that give us the possibility to profoundly understand each other. These stories deal with the fundamental conditions of life, and the thoughts they are built of are the very source of feelings of meaning and value. In these ideas I have been influenced by the writings of Mircea Eliade and Sigmund Freud among others.
“The Mirror of Simple Souls” by medieval christian mystic Marguerite Porete, gnostic texts like “Thunder, Perfect Mind” and the “St. John Passion” by J.S. Bach have influenced my more recent work - work that has been focused on love and its relation to life and death. I am influenced by the art of Fransisco de Goya, Odilon Redon and Remedios Varo as well as by nordic art from the last turn of the century; Writers like Selma Lagerlöf and Dan Andersson and artists like Hugo Simberg and Einar Nielsen are some influences. In sculpture I am mostly drawn to the work of Gustav Vigeland, Carl Milles and Ivar Lindecrantz.
My work is mainly sculpture, relief and installations in wood and ceramics. I also make drawings. It is very important for me to understand the materials I work with, and what they want to express. I try to make space for automatic processes by not making detailed sketches and by letting my mind wander.