Galleri Riis

Jan Groth

Jan Groth (1938-2022) was a leading artist of his generation in Scandinavia, with numerous exhibitions in museums and institutions throughout the world. Through his long artistic practice, Groth exclusively and continuously explored the relationship between the line and the picture plane. First and foremost in drawings executed with crayon on paper, but also in monumental tapestries that were made in collaboration with his former partner Benedikte Groth (1933-2015) in Copenhagen.

In the late 1980s he brought the line into three-dimensional space with bronze sculptures spanning the intimate scale of the drawings, to the monumental in several public works. Groth literally wove together the immediate with the gradual; the drawing on paper extracted in an instant was through a labour-intensive process transcribed into the structure of the tapestry, and through meticulous manipulation of wax in his models for bronze sculptures. His artistic idiom could be described as restrained expressionism, with a profound sensibility wherein the line's seemingly seismographic recordings appear to visualise nuances and energies registered from within.

His latest institutional solo exhibitions include "Linear Tapestries", Minneapolis Institute of Art in 2018 and The Festival Exhibition in Bergen Kunsthall in 2017. His works are represented in the collections of numerous museums around the world, among others: The Museum of Modern Art, New York, The Art Institute of Chicago, Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Humlebæk, Denmark, The Tate Gallery, London, England, Musée National d´Art Moderne, Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris, Moderna Museet, Stockholm, The National Museum of Art, Architecture and Design, Oslo.

Jan Groth was born 1938 in Stavanger, Norway and died 2022 in Oslo, Norway, where he lived and worked for the last 20 years.


ARTIST'S HOMEPAGE

BIBLIOGRAPHY


EDUCATION

SELECTED SOLO EXHIBITIONS

  1. 2021Sandefjord Kunstforening, Sandefjord, Norway
  2. 2020Glogerfestival Exhibition, Kongsberg Kunstforening, Kongsberg, Norway
  3. 2019Signs and Figures, Galleri Riis, Oslo
  4. 2018Linear Tapestries, Minneapolis Institute of Art, Minneapolis, Minnesota
  5. 2017The Bundle, Wall Drawings and Other Recent Works, Galleri Riis, Oslo
  6. 2017The Festival Exhibition 2017, Bergen Kunsthall, Bergen
  7. 2015Sign - Drawing, Tapestry, Sculpture, Chart Art Fair, Copenhagen
  8. 2015In between - liberation the line, Galleri Riis, Stockholm
  9. 2013Galleri Ismene, Trondheim
  10. 2012New Drawings, Galleri Riis, Oslo
  11. 2009Traces and Spaces, Henie Onstad Art Centre, Høvikodden, Norway
  12. 2009Drammens Museum, Drammen, Norway
  13. 2006Galleri Riis, Oslo
  14. 2006The Art Museum of Northern Norway, Tromsø, Norway
  15. 2002Dagali Museum, Geilo
  16. 2002Hallingdal Folkemuseum, Nesbyen
  17. 2002Logendalen Folkemuseum, Kongsberg
  18. 2001Hara Museum ARC, Japan
  19. 2001Sign, The National Museum of Art, Architecture and Design, Oslo
  20. 1997Amos Anderson Art Museum, Helsinki, Finland
  21. 1995Rogaland Museum of Fine Arts, Stavanger, Norway
  22. 1993Trondhjems Kunstforening, Trondheim, Norway
  23. 1992Fundacion San Telmo, Buenos Aires, Argentina
  24. 1991Nantenshi Gallery, Tokyo, Japan
  25. 1990Diane Brown Gallery, New York, USA
  26. 1990The National Museum of Art, Architecture and Design, Oslo
  27. 1989Porin Taidemuseo, Pori, Finland
  28. 1989Jan Groth: Drawings 1975-1985, La Jolla Museum of Contemporary Art, San Diego
  29. 1988Hara Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo, Japan
  30. 1988Jan Groth, Nantenshi Gallery, Tokyo, Japan
  31. 1988Jan Groth: Tapestries 1981-1988, Randers Kunstmuseum, Randers, Denmark
  32. 1988Jan Groth: Tapestries 1982-1988, Galleri Riis, Oslo
  33. 1986Moderna Museet, Stockholm
  34. 1986Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York
  35. 1986Jan Groth, Marian Goodman Gallery, New York
  36. 1985Galleri Riis, Oslo
  37. 1983Marian Goodman Gallery, New York
  38. 1981Wadsworth Athenum, Hartford, USA
  39. 1981Jan Groth, Twenty years of tapestries and drawings, Nordjyllands Kunstmuseum, Aalborg, Denmark
  40. 1980Museum of Modern Art, Oxford, England
  41. 1980Jan Groth, Recent Works. Betty Parsons Gallery, New York
  42. 1979Staatliche Kunsthalle, Baden-Baden, Germany
  43. 1979Städtlische Galerie im Lenbachaus, München, Germany
  44. 1979Aarhus Kunstmuseum, Denmark
  45. 1979Liljevalchs Konsthall, Stockholm, Sweden
  46. 1978Jan Groth, Thematic drawings, Henie Onstad Art Centre, Høvikodden, Norway
  47. 1976Musée d´Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, France
  48. 1975Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Humlebæk, Denmark
  49. 1974Henie Onstad Art Centre, Høvikodden, Norway
  50. 1973The Art Institute of Chicago, USA
  51. 1972Betty Parsons Gallery, New York

SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS

  1. 2018Light Lines: The Art of Jan Groth, Inger Johanne Grytting, and Thomas Pihl, Scandinavia House, New York
  2. 2016Jan Groth, Matias Faldbakken, Fredrik Værslev, Galleri Riis, Stockholm
  3. 2014Take Form (with Kristina Matousch, Lisa Tan and Eline Mugaas), Galleri Riis, Stockholm
  4. 2013Jan Groth + Tone Vigeland, The Vigeland Museum, Oslo
  5. 2011Parallels, Northern Norway Art Museum, Tromsø, Norway
  6. 2006An Atlas of Drawings, Museum of Modern Art, New York
  7. 2003Dialogo/Dialog, Museu do Arte Moderna, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
  8. 2002Jan Groth, Stein Rønning, Heidi Skjerve, Kjell Bjørgeengen, Stavanger Art Museum, Norway
  9. 199779/97, Visual Arts Gallery, New York
  10. 1997Erling Neby Collection, Pori Art Museum, Finland
  11. 1995Matrix is 20, Wadsworth Atheneum, Hartford, Connecticut, USA
  12. 1986New Visions in Contemporary Art, The RSM-Company Collection Cincinnati Art Museum, Cincinnati, USA
  13. 197820th Century Drawings, The Art Institute of Chicago, USA

SELECTED PUBLIC COLLECTIONS