BABY-RETROSPECTIVE – JAN-ERIK ANDERSSON

PRESS RELEASE

On Saturday, March 31, 1990, the Pori Art Museum will open Baby Retrospective, an exhibition by Turku-based artist Jan-Erik Andersson (b. 1954), celebrating the tenth anniversary of his artistic career. Andersson’s “trademark”—the basic forms of classical modernism: the triangle, circle, and square—first emerged during his studies in the early 1980s. Since then, these forms have faithfully accompanied him in a playful journey, a kind of game that he has engaged in both as an outsider and as an active participant in the conventions of the Finnish art world.

For nearly a decade, Jan-Erik Andersson has conducted a dialogue with artists he holds dear—sometimes with established classics but more often with the masters of our recent past or contemporary era. His art blends art historical references with strong autobiographical elements, challenging the viewer to question traditional “sacred” values and learned criteria of good taste. In this comprehensive process, many heroes of global art have been drawn into an arena of equal and direct conversation.

Just as Jan-Erik Andersson’s art is a continuous commentary, his exhibition also critiques a current phenomenon in the international art world: the myth of the young genius, the artist as hero. The past decade has demonstrated the importance of the artist—preferably a young “prodigy”—within the machinery of overheated art markets. An entire generation of young artists has been elevated to the status of “museum artists” at an unprecedentedly early stage. Critics praised them, prices soared with recognition, and the resulting demand for increased production, sales, and success became essential to sustain the art world’s mechanisms. Andersson’s exhibition seems to ask, with self-irony: “Too much, too soon?”

A Baby Retrospective Catalogue will be published in Finnish, Swedish, and English in conjunction with the exhibition, featuring extensive illustrations. The publication includes an article by Sixten Ringbom, Professor of Art History at Åbo Akademi University, titled Taide JÄRJESTELMÄN sisällä (Art Within the System), and another by art critic Leena-Maija Rossi, titled Silmän ilo ja naurun asia – saako taide pitää hauskaa tosissaan? (The Joy of the Eye and the Laughter of Art—Can Art Be Seriously Fun?).

Publication:
ISBN 951-9355-26-X Jan-Erik Andersson: The Baby Retrospective 1980-1990
Editing: Marketta Seppälä
Translations: Karen Kimball, Virpi Vainikainen, Kari Vähäpassi
Photographs: Henry Edman, Antonin Halas, Esko Nummelin, Yrjö Räikkälä, Juhani Niiranen
Graphic Design: Manno Kalliomäki
Grafia, Turku 1990

Translated with ChatGPT