Ulf Erik Hjalmar Nilsson
I enter the gallery 5 minutes before the announced opening time, with a large roll of canvas on my shoulder and a bag full of tools. I start the performance by asking the gallerist to borrow a ladder. Dressed in a clown nose I start my lamps. The gallery space is lit up with sequential changing colored light and I initially quote Paul McCarthy from his 1995 video work Painter by grunting ”Paint, Paint”, referring to a similar situation in Painter; the myth of the artist character.
Talking to the audience, presenting myself and the work at the same time climbing the ladder, I'm murmuring and nailing up the 320 x 245 cm canvas on the wall, in front of the large store-front window. I continue painting and talk about the motif I've already started on: a paraphrase on a 1860's photograph by Eadweard Muybridge from his photo series Valley of the Yosemite.
My collaborator Dj Joakim Cosmo is playing musical themes to accompany the animated picture and me as a performer, finishing the painting.
The painting is an animated visualization of a mythical valley. A waterfall and river are showing natures wildness and calmness simultaneously. The sphere in the horizon and the floor pattern under the forrest ground represent man-made constructions (borrowed from the Pantheon in Rome). A spinning circle of colors resembles a childish toy, playfully showing the rhythm of the wind in the valley.
The street and facades facing the gallery window are completely lit up at night by the changing lights of the installation. This can be seen from a far distance in the city center. Every night through the window the finished installation shows itself to an audience of by-passers, from the gallery's closing time until the morning comes.
Last update March 2026