Norwegian artist Tor-Arne Moen’s artwork is a reminder of the past. In his imagery, it is through recollections of family life and coming-of-age stories. In the creation of the work, it is the use of the classic medium oil-egg tempera. The combination of the two enhances the aesthetic, with the medium lending itself nicely to the old-time flair that the works conjure.
At the heart of Moen’s art is the storytelling, which comes alive on the canvases through casts of characters that are emotional and nostalgic. Yet, these are not the only stories that Moen tells. His lifelong fascination with the narrative has led him to writing, photography and even filmmaking, which all inform his artwork. Then, there is the influence of outside sources as well.
Before My Time, oil-egg tempera on canvas, 47 1/8 x 66 7/8"
“For me, the practice of photography, painting, literature and film has turned into a way of life. Although I primarily consider myself a painter, the other arts are prerequisites for my painting. I often get inspiration and energy for my motifs from books, as from purely visual studies,” Moen elaborates. “My breakthrough as a painter came in 1994 when I presented a series of 33 paintings related to the Norwegian author and Nobel Prize-winner Knut Hamsun’s Collected Works. Through this artwork, I made a connection between the Norwegian painter Edvard Munch and Hamsun by immersing myself in Munch’s picturesque stories and using his visual idiom to interpret Hamsun.”
Mooring, oil-egg tempera on canvas, 35 3/8 x 35 3/8"
From his studies of Hamsun, Moen was led to the American author Ernest Hemingway. “Hamsun’s publishing house in Norway, Gyldendal, was the first publisher outside the United States to translate and print a book by Hemingway—the novel The Sun Also Rises,” Moen says. “We know that Hamsun was very excited about that novel, and supposedly, Hemingway expressed great literary debt to Hamsun.”
Since his discovery of Hemingway’s work, Moen has read all of his novels and he has become captivated by how Hemingway conveyed a scene through words. “He writes with a mood-saturated human voice that is hard and soft at the same time, and he is capable of evoking atmosphere and creating a desire to be exactly where he is and do exactly what he does,” Moen explains, adding that the author’s work provides an insight into a bygone time. “But still a time that is no further away than the stories our parents and grandparents have witnessed. It is as if we can feel that we have lived those experiences ourselves, when brought to life to us through old photographs, movies, books and paintings.”
Moen has always been attracted to old photographs, particularly those blurry black-and-white amateur images that show moments from the life of family and friends that are long forgotten, but yet so familiar. These are translated into his paintings, such as Mooring, where you see “an older brother allowing his little brother to moor the boat,” or Picnic Preparations, which could be “someone’s uncle dressed in his Sunday suit repairing a girl’s bicycle bell.”
“The life-affirming and charming, but yet wistful and irreversible sentiment of these photographs gives me associations with books I have read, movies I have seen and stories I have been told, and all this provides an intense desire to paint,” Moen says. “Such pictures can be directly triggering for entire series of paintings.”
My Brave Brother, oil-egg tempera on canvas, 35 3/8 x 35 3/8”
This includes Moen’s latest series of works that will be on display at RJD Gallery in Bridgehampton, New York, this summer. The show, titled Summer Memories, focuses on moments that recall some of life’s tiniest joys.
“We love Tor-Arne’s uncanny ability to capture the memories that we all hold dear in such a way that we actually can transport ourselves into the painting and bask in the sunshine, smell the sea and feel the sand between our toes,” says RJD Gallery director Joi Jackson Perle. “Our connections to one another are more important than ever before and Summer Memories lets us hold fast to those who are most dear to us even if it’s just through a trip down memory lane.”
Picnic Preparations, oil-egg tempera on canvas, 35 3/8 x 35 3/8"
One of the newest pieces for the show is Garden of Eden, which developed when he came across a photograph of a beautiful, young couple. In his work the pair lay lovingly in a field of heather and have that look of adoration on their faces. “Hemingway’s novel, from which I borrowed the name, is one of my favorites. Both in and underneath the text there vibrates and bubbles this erotic and sensual summer mood that makes you want to partake and remain submersed in, without ending. Although the story in this novel inevitably steers toward an iceberg, its presence is unforgettable,” Moen says. “Spending time studying this photograph was a wonderful experience and so too the process of trying to evoke and re-create the mood I felt radiating from it. Every now and then, I forgot the time gap between the captions of that moment in the heather, about 60 years ago, and the present moment, as I stood in front of the easel trying to imagine what the colors might have been, trying to recognize just that mood, right then.”
Potato Peelers, oil-egg tempera on canvas, 35 3/8 x 35 3/8"
Hemingway also inspired another work in the show, Pipe Smoker, but instead of drawing from an old photograph, Moen used his wife, Martine, as a live model posing with the rifle and pipe. “It felt liberating to be in the same room as the model again,” he says. “It is sometimes necessary when my visual aid has been only a small, blurry, 56-year-old black-and-white photograph.”
Summer Memories is scheduled to run June 18 through July 18. —
Tor-Arne Moen: Summer Memories
When: June 18-July 18, 2020
Where: RJD Gallery, 2385 Main Street, Bridgehampton, NY 11932
Information: (631) 725-1161, www.rjdgallery.com
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