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Rasmus Nilausen’s “Theatre of Doubts’ in Palma

 Thu, Oct 10 2024
(Above and below) Rasmus Nilausen, “The Theatre of Doubts” (2021). Installation view in “Especies de espacios. Una reflexión colectiva sobre qué pensar de este mundo” at Galería Pelaires in Palma, Mallorca. Photos: David Bonet. Courtesy of the artist.



Danish-born, Barcelona-based artist Rasmus Nilausen is presenting, until November 22, 2024, a version of his installation “The Theatre of Doubts” (2021) in the group show “Especies de espacios. Una reflexión colectiva sobre qué pensar de este mundo” at Galería Pelaires in Palma, Mallorca. 


(Above and below) Rasmus Nilausen, “The Theatre of Doubts” (2021). Installation view in “Especies de espacios. Una reflexión colectiva sobre qué pensar de este mundo” at Galería Pelaires in Palma, Mallorca. Photos: David Bonet. Courtesy of the artist.




For Galería Pelaires, Nilausen selected a range of works from the original seven rows that composed the installation. The original version consisted of 49 paintings of varied sizes produced between 2014 and 2021, presented on wooden easels with a peculiarity that became one of the show's most beloved features: their cartoon-like feet. The installation filled the entire circular room of the Meier building.

The work was originally commissioned for MACBA Museu d'Art Contemporani de Barcelona’s inaugural triennial “Panorama” titled “Notes for an Eye Fire” (October 2021–February 2022), curated by Hiuwai Chu (MACBA’s Head of Exhibitions) and Latitudes.

 (Above and below) Rasmus during the installation of “Theatre of Doubts” at MACBA; Installing the larger paintings at MACBA. Photos: Latitudes.


(Above and below) Rasmus Nilausen, “The Theatre of Doubts” (2021). Installation view in “Panorama. Notes for an Eye Fire”, MACBA Museu d'Art Contemporani de Barcelona, October 2021–February 2022. Courtesy of the artist. Photos: Roberto Ruiz. 







Exhibition wall text in “Panorama 21. Notes for an Eye Fire”:

Rasmus Nilausen’s installation of paintings is a homage to philosopher Giulio Camillo’s sublime and ridiculous attempt to explain the entire universe and allow all its relations and meanings to be beheld at once. Camillo built his “Theatre of Memory” in Venice in around 1530. Inverting the perspective of classical theatre, a single spectator could stand on a central “stage” to look out at an auditorium of seven rows of seven pictures. An occult matrix of divine, celestial, and terrestrial knowledge, this mystical rhetorical device enabled the entirety of existence and its workings to be called to mind and read off. Evidently flawed and over-ambitious, Nilausen’s liberal revival of the memory theatre format draws on 49 works from his own painterly and allegorical universe. Visitors are invited to wander among images that seem to be going for a walk, adopt multiple viewpoints, see unfamiliar connections, and summon new memories. The first row takes on the seven planetary deities of Camillo’s Renaissance design: Diana (the Moon), Mercury, Venus, the Sun (represented by a banquet), Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn.

Produced by MACBA Museu d'Art Contemporani de Barcelona with the support of the Danish Arts Foundation.

More about the work, here (pdf).

Giulio Camillo was a sixteenth-century Italian philosopher, most notable for conceiving “Theatre of Memory”.


Nilausen is also exhibiting “Fixed Ideas,” a solo show at EtHall Gallery in L'Hospitalet de Llobregat, Barcelona, presenting new and recent works. The show will be on view until November 7, 2024. 

Rasmus Nilausen “Fixed Ideas” at EtHall Gallery in Barcelona. Photos: Latitudes.




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 2021, 2024, apunts per a un incendi dels ulls, Barcelona, ethall, MACBA, mallorca, painting, Palma, Rasmus Nilausen
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