Sif Itona Westerberg: Twin Flame, Double Ruin
@ The Richard H. Driehaus Museum
40 E Erie St, Chicago, IL 60611
On view through Sunday, April 14th
Sif Itona Westerberg: Twin Flame, Double Ruin is the first solo US museum exhibition of Copenhagen-based artist Sif Itona Westerberg, featuring recent bronze and concrete sculptures that draw from popular mythological narratives in dialogue with the museum’s richly-ornamented 1883 Nickerson Mansion. Curated by Stephanie Cristello, Sif Itona Westerberg: Twin Flame, Double Ruin is the fourth iteration of the Driehaus Museum’s contemporary art series, A Tale of Today, in which emerging artists build upon the immersive experience and cultural history of the Gilded Age building to expand our understanding of the world through the art, architecture, design.
Sif Itona Westerberg: Twin Flame, Double Ruin takes inspiration from the Ancient Greek myth of soulmates—a single body that was divided into two parts, fated to forever yearn and search for its reflection. The exhibition title borrows terminology from concepts of interpersonal connection, a ‘twin flame’ often described in modern psychology as akin to soulmates. Westerberg contrasts ideals of creation and metamorphoses with the idea of ‘ruin,’ a double entendre in reference to either disaster, or the remnants of Classical artifacts.
Creating a language of hybrid forms, Westerberg transforms common industrial materials such as aerated concrete into delicate, sensitive surfaces engraved with the retellings of ancient lore. Using material to explore the technological advances of industrialization, as well as the disenchantment that replaced myth in the dawn of modern society, Westerberg’s work offers a deeper understanding of the Nickerson Mansion and the cultural and social ideals of the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries.
Westerberg’s work will be on view in the Driehaus Museum’s Second Floor galleries, and will include a site-specific installation in the stained-glass domed Maher Gallery. The exhibition also includes a gallery of works from the Museum’s permanent collection in response to themes in Westerberg’s work.
A Tale of Today, Sif Itona Westerberg: Twin Flame, Double Ruin, is generously supported by the Danish Arts Foundation, the Ny Carlsberg Foundation, the Richard H. Driehaus Annual Exhibition Fund and Dirk Denison and David Salkin.
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Tags: Chicago, Illinois, Near North Side, Sif Itona Westerberg, The Richard H. Driehaus Museum, Twin Flame Double Ruin
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