A charged spectrum.
Malou Bergman’s photographs and artistic work are distinguished from most of the contemporary Swedish art. The stunning colours of the pictures and the kaleidoscopic collage technique, which has become her signature, makes her unique. However, the viewer will soon wonder what is behind the multifaceted images. Also, these messages are clearly available to the curious. The works that Bergman creates is at the same time as complex as her technical process. They often originate from mythological themes.
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Choosing the artist’s track was not obvious for Malou Bergman, who also studied social anthropology and art science at Stockholm University, but also worked as an actor and model. These experiences have made clear impressions in Bergman’s artistry, along with her experiences of living and working around the world. Bergman started his photographic education at Christer Strömholms GFU in Stockholm and then studied in New York at the International Center of Photography (ICP). The latter education and the city also made strong impressions with their energy and all their possibilities. However, this was in contrast to Bergman’s image world where the urban rarely is present. Crosswise, Bergman seeks to look at human more original environments.
Malou Bergman has developed a special image creation that was initially performed by double exposures and experiments in the darkroom. This work has been further developed and deepened with digital tools and Photoshop, where she works with countless layers and filters. Bergman’s works are also slowly mature and emerge, more like painting and finally formed into a finished product, a large-scale photograph. Bergman is more inspired by literature, theater and art than influenced by other photographers.
The images are both arranged, directed and manipulated, all performed with this playfulness and spontaneity that permeates her entire business and person. The creation of creatures becomes a weave of stories in a sea of memories where the thread of the time has been resurrected, and develops an urgent mirror towards the present. The themes that return are world-wide, general-human stories that are loaded politically, emotionally and spiritually. Bergman is undoubtedly a searcher. As such, she constantly challenges herself, her imaginations of the world, and her dogmas. But she does not look for a truth but after a generous constructive drawing. In this process, she also invites the viewer to transform her mind patterns and predicted sentences. Although the images are often both mythological, dreamy and enigmatic, it is still not possible to categorise them as escapism.
What Bergman does is not to fly without looking up and confronting the world with a possible alternative reality. Bergman’s photographs still exist as independent images, aesthetic objects, full of power, dynamics and energy.
