Henrik Håkansson,
untitled (SELVA LACANDONA) (detail)

16 C-prints, 2008
Image: 20.3 cm x 29.8 cm each
AP
Image courtesy the artist Galleria Franco Noero, Turin

Estimate: $23,000

Based in Stockholm, Henrik Håkansson (b. 1968) creates expansive installations with biological and technological elements. His work asks questions about the relationship between nature and culture and his works focus on the observation of plants, birds, insects or other creatures and their surroundings which he records or reconstructs using an array of visual, audio or scientific instruments. In the 2007 group exhibition Been Up So Long It Looks Like Down To Me at Presentation House Gallery, Håkansson showed a live coconut palm tree attached to the wall. Lit with grow lights to mimic sunlight, the palm tree literally grew sideways from the wall over the course of the exhibition. Selva Lacandona is comprised of sixteen photographs of majestic trees seen sideways taken in the jungle of the same name in Chiapas, Mexico. This work makes direct reference to his sculpture and indirectly to the upside down tree photographs of Rodney Graham. Important international exhibitions featuring Håkansson’s work include the 50th Venice Biennale, the 26th Sao Paolo Biennale, the 8th Lyon Biennale and the 8th Sharjah Biennale. He has exhibited at the Hamburger Bahnhof, Berlin; Castello di Rivoli, Turin; Palais de Tokyo, Paris; and the Vancouver Art Gallery, and had a solo exhibition at the Contemporary Art Gallery, Vancouver in 2007. Håkansson is represented by The Modern Institute, Glasgow and Galleria Franco Noero, Turin.