Interview
Tone Aaness
Tone Aaness is a Norwegian contemporary painter, born in 1973. Her works are mainly philosophical, political and mythological in their Expression and a Depth to Contemporary Realism is maintained and influenced by painters such as the French realist Courbet, the Catalan born modernist Picasso, the Italian chiaro-scuro painter Caravaggio, the English Prerafaelite Millais, the Norwegian expressionist Edvard Munch and the monumental Sculptor Gustav Vigeland among others.
What is your background and how did you start your journey in the art world?
“I started early to draw and sew, and also to write. I was only 8 years old when I wrote my first poetry collection. I had a head for theory, they said, so I studied 8 years in University. Later, I attended academies of art and went as an apprentice in a studio to learn Renaissance techniques, the old school of Verrocchio, I guess, that Leonardo da Vinci was put through, believe it or not!
I learned photography in school and ceramics every week when I was in my teens. I handcrafted sculptures in wood, and later I made my first dresses. I had a good friend. He always supported me, said I looked amazing, even in a piece of orange and brown squared curtains that I had remade for a skirt. I was 18 and I actually thought it was true. I still remember that evening, I had a pair of Wood Lumps that I had painted orange too, they were kind of difficult to balance, I felt absolutely gorgeous ‘till I left the disco and fell down the stairs.
I left for Florence to learn how to craft figurative paintings later. I wanted to train my eyes. I love that renaissance city. Actually, I had the Stendhal syndrome the first time I visited. I had to sleep for a day. It overwhelmed me. Later I went back to learn Italian at a Language Institution, got a whole lot of friends and tried to get into the public Academy of Art by Academia where the original stone sculpture David by Michelangelo is exhibited. I cried a bit when they turned me down. I consider it lucky today since figurative methods were not preferred at the time. I wanted to be a figurative painter, with an individual and personal approach, of course. So, I went on to Figurative Academies in the same city. That shaped my abilities and who I am today, I think.
I had a journalist visiting me from Norway one of the years. I showed him and his fellow companions around in the Uffizzi Gallery, one of the most magnificent galleries in the world. This was after we had finished an interview for the newspaper back home. I had taken him around in the studio where I painted. I was pregnant with my daughter, and had a very wise advice from Secchi, the main suppliers for figurative artists in Florence, not to use lead white. It is dangerous for the baby. If you are a pregnant artist; keep that in mind! I have heard that pregnant women are on their height of intelligence, so maybe that was the reason for the journalist calling it the ultimate guiding experience just some months ago. He still remembered it.
It made me humble to have a small baby girl in Italy. In Naples they told me ‘aguri’ on the streets, in Rome too. We travelled everywhere and she was welcomed as an Italian princess when she came to the world. They called her ‘La Bella Bimba’ everywhere. My daughter missed that sort of attention a lot when we came back to Norway, we are more moderate in our praising, but we are becoming better at it. She still cherishes Italy as her second home country.
I think there is transition appearing in the journey as an artist, from the stumbling start to when you begin to arrive at something, it is most often linked to prizes and exhibitions.”
What inspires you?
“Most of our lives are connected to transitions. Everything can be an inspiration. Having a baby is really a big change, it is a magnificent experience and a very biological one. You feel graced. During those years a lot of my paintings were of sleeping babies. They are beautiful memories, sitting watching the baby sleeping in total confidence and trust of the world. This was the reason why I made the suitcase. It is called the Awakening. The title has a wide range of references just as sleep in itself. In addition, there is the transformation to motherhood or fatherhood, sister and brotherhood, or even seeing someone else change to that shape, and that is maybe what we could describe as first hand perceptions. Then, there is the audience, and the idea of the suitcase with the sleeping baby as an art work, disconnected from everything, as a piece of art in itself. An Italian Magazine, wrote; ‘The Contemporary Realism by Tone Aaness is put forward in a suitcase of wood as the base of the painting that represent a new born baby. It may suggest a new birth, life brought to journey in the maternal body, or migration hopefully for better conditions in life, and all these suggestions of variations of movements are always present.’ I thought that was a beautiful way of seeing it!”
What themes do you pursue? Is there an underlying message in your work?
“I am a heavy runner, so I am practicing on keeping it light, but there are no classical art without the emphasizing of anatomy, the origin of humanity, the building of light and shades or the construction of a three dimensional idea on a two dimensional surface. Redemption was made as a compliment to the world as we see it, very burdened with impressions. How are we supposed to see through a visual design to find a deeper meaning in our lives and carry on with grace and meaningfulness in the shape that we are born in, the age that we possess? How do we connect or disconnect?
Vivienne Westwood, who I was as lucky to photograph in Florence 2021, carried her underlaying messages as manifests on top of her design. That made her talk on the side of her designed art works, as part of belonging to a greater universe of meaning. I remember she said once in an TV interview as a comment to sustainability in our common ecology: ‘Don`t buy anything, but if you buy, buy a Vivienne Westwood.’ I thought that was a bit fun. It says something about the human condition.
It was a magnificent journey for me as a photographer, even with a mobile camera to be able to walk with Vivienne Westwood through the art journey of a lifetime the year before she died. I am very humble when I catch unforgettable moments in time, where things just happen. I think she even invited me for dinner, I just did not understand the idea of being invited at the time. She left the message about where they were eating at the head of administration, she told me on my way out. It took me some years to understand such a concept in a world with that many fans and followers. In my world, I would have felt that I stalked her. I bought her book that year and she even looked for me to sign it. I was nearly 50 years and she called me up before all the fans and audience: ‘Where is the girl with my book?’ That was me.”
How would you describe your work?
“I do make a lot of clothes myself, mostly as comments to happenings, but often as part of a second hand movement as well. I redesign or adjust the shape of nearly anything to fit me somehow. It is what I like to do. I find it meaningful to create things, but not in a planned manner, in a successive manner. ‘The Dress’ was a project I had in relation to an Installation about migration and war. It was made with the cut outs of poppies from a green cloth, that I sewed to a kitchen cloth with a silk dress on top. I made a poppy helmet as well. I was thinking of protection, but what does really protect us, is hard to say. Animals, they say, are pre programmed, evolution often happens from accidents, human involvement or common change in adaptions. We are more about emotions and reason, even though I think Noam Chomsky would contradict me.”
Which artists influence you most?
“I like monumentalists, right now I find it very hard to ignore Anselm Kiefer. It takes me back and forward at the same time, to see some of his pieces. His art is really unbelievable, to be honest. I like that type of impressions, Louis Borguois has something of the same. You feel that lived life shows in the art. I used to admire Francis Bacon, and Lucian Freud as well, but they are more repetitive. I’ve seen some shows with their works. In Italy I visited a lot of places to see most works of Artemisia Gentileschi. They had a really big ChiaroScuro exhibition in Palazzo Pitti in Florence, and a lot of works by her was exhibited, such as a ‘The beheading of Holofernes,’ ‘Judith and her maiden servant’ etc. There were some headlights by Caravaggio in there too, ‘The Sacrifice of Isaac’ and I remember my daughter kept asking, she was just a kid; what was that guy doing? I did not know what to say. One should really think some times how much Bible history one tells to a five year old and what to avoid, or tell later. A Norwegian fluent speaking Mormon came up to us and said he was totally devastated with that child, she showed interest in everything in there. I was really impressed with her too.
What I like about Artemisia is that most people are strong and realistic, in Orazios works, for instance (her father) he often shows glorification and simplified beauty. I like strong women, I think they are good for us all. You kind of grow into Artemisia, I think it has to do with Caravaggio, he was exceptionally balanced, it takes time to see different aspects of beauty and performance in the same, but later, movement of Tannenbrism. I still think the most fun I had in a museum was in the Piccasso museum in Barcelona. That was an amazing variation of sculptures, ideas and impressions. It felt like my head was falling off when I came out of it. In Venice there are two really great artists, one is Titian and the other is Tintoretto. I always learnt that the masterpieces are build upon exceptionality, such as Donatello` s Maria Magdalena in Museo del Duomo in Florence or ‘The Expulsion of Adam and Eve’ by Masaccio in the Brancacci Chapel on Piazza del Carmine in the same City.
In the US it surprised me that private collectors are that important for museums. They often collect pieces and donate after death. That is pretty impressive, in MoMA for instance there are whole collections of paintings given by families. They are unbelievable in their qualities, I could see paintings of really great importance by Salvador Dali that are not to be found in the museum in Barcelona, in his summerhouse in Cadeques or Mueso Dali in Figueres. Frida Kahlo also has a lot of really groundbreaking paintings in that museum. I find it really touching how Diego Rivera, being that famous at the time, just build Kahlo up and supported her as an artist. Her dimensions, motifs and her formats were very different from him. Their works were also wonderful examples of political freedom and how that would affect them personally. They had to return to Mexico after a while. Her last words in her diary are supposedly: ‘Spero che l`uscita sia felice e spero di non tornare mai piu.’ which means ‘I hope the end will be happy and I hope that I will never return again.’ That says something about the challenges in life.”
“I find it meaningful to create things, but not in a planned manner, in a successive manner.”
What is your creative process like?
“I often make a sketch or a note, and then I go on with life. I never know when I will get back to it. It just reminds me of motifs I look forward to start out, I have a lot of things to look forward to, actually. It will be a journey. The challenge is always the same, will I be able to make it? Will there be compromises?”
What is an artist’s role in society and how do you see that evolving?
“It is hard to say, I think. It is a peculiar position. It is kind of without measurements. Most artists I have known are very different, thinks different, perform different, dress different. I like that someone breaks the consensus. It is a problem that we often want to blend in and stay in silence, as we were a flock of sheep. I like that too, many times, but I believe society grows with complexity. It has to do with the human brain, it is underdeveloped for most of our lives, just due to few challenges, and no will to oppose ourselves. I am speaking of personal challenges, not the passive ones imposed by others. They will come anyway, most people never speaks about dreams they don’t pursue. It could be simple factors as wearing a red hat, sleeping in a tent during winter time, doing a class of yoga, taking a coffee with a friend, going to a movie on your own because you want to see it. The idea of having someone else watching your actions, or wonder what they will think, is really complex. The Danish scientist and poet, Piet Hein, said in one of his poems. They were all called GRUKs: The fear that ruins many people’s peace, the fear what people may believe. You may say only one thing till, that people believe what ever they will!
I often feel very strange in my costumes, and probably many would have me off that path, I often feel like that myself too. Who am I to become? I am not an actor, but I am weirdly dressed. I am not a player, but I play. I am not a musician, but I compose. It is a strange position. Performances are hard to define. Performance as an art form hardly has a definition. Painting is easier to relate to, but I still would like to keep a lot of the burdens I see away from the audience. I see really heavy patterns that are very sad. They are heavy to break, and they ruin a lot of lives. Shall we speak about it or remain in silence?”
Have you had any noteworthy exhibitions you'd like to share?
“I am looking forward to exhibit with works from Rembrandt next year. I am invited and hope I will be able to do it. That will be beyond belief. Yes, I hope I will be able to make it. I was granted the International Prize Velazquez and Goya some months ago. This was one of the most prestigious moments of my life. Gaudi is my favourite architect and to see La Pedrera/ La Casa Mila once more was beyond belief. I will forever be grateful for this honour. Just before Christmas I received the prestigious ‘Artists at the Jubilee’ Prize in Rome. And now in January, I will receive ‘Artist of the Year’ in Florence. It will be beyond belief.”
Instagram: @Tone.Aaness
Brush Bio: brush.bio/toneaaness
