Larsen / Warner is thrilled to present Dive Heaven Water Hell, a solo exhibition by Swedish artist Elisabeth Frieberg, the artists first with the gallery. The exhibition features an extraordinary suite of new paintings continuing the artist's tireless and rigorous investigation into the nature and possibilities of abstraction within painting.
Text by Erik Wahlin
The water’s surface is a sharp boundary between the human world and the murky primordial soup. The boundary is as much metaphorical as it is biological. Beneath the surface, rationality dissolves into a chaos that has persisted since the first primitive single-celled organisms emerged there 3–4 billion years ago. Above the surface lies a realm of elevated reason, closer to God’s light. Below, darkness reigns.
In the nine works that make up Dive Heaven Water Hell the sea is a central theme; figurative, symbolic, and often subtle. One of the pieces is set in space: the life-giving sun in Sun, Stars, No. 1 radiates daylight in celestial blue and gold towards the viewer. The edges of the painting are brushed with a muted starlight, looking into the dark void of space, a symbolic ocean. The sun, like all stars, is a solitary, microscopic point of light, with Earth a lucky little oasis in the vast darkness.
Sky and sea are tied together in the oldest work in the exhibition, Dive, Heaven, Water, Hell, No. 2. The piece is inspired by Duccio di Buoninsegna’s The Temptation on the Mount, part of The Frick Collection in New York. In the 14th-century painting, the devil attempts to tempt Jesus to worship him by offering dominion over creation. Jesus points in rejection, with angels behind him. In Frieberg’s Dive, Heaven, Water, Hell, No. 2, the devil plummets back into hell, tail between his legs.
Frieberg works in a form of seemingly abstract nature painting, where eight of the nine pieces borrow wholly or partly from the sea. For example, F. 16, 8, 20, Indian Ocean includes colours and patterns from three different tropical fish near the island of Vihamanaafushi in the Indian Ocean. Equipped with a snorkel and mask, Frieberg swam out to a coral reef, memorised one or two fish, swam back to shore, and documented their colours and patterns using gouache on paper. The method is time-consuming, demanding, and requires technical skill, trained colour perception, and patience. Frieberg systematically creates similar colour charts, deconstructing landscapes into individual shades. The rain-like pattern that lashes across the canvas in F. 16, 8, 20, Indian Ocean reflects the colour of the ocean’s surface a short distance out from the beach. At the inauguration of the permanent work Notes, Vihamanaafushi, Indian Ocean at the Stockholm School of Economics in 2023, Professor Sara Rosengren compared the process to a researcher’s structured note-taking. The method symbolically belongs above the surface, in the bright, rational world where humanity, as the crown of creation, imposes order on nature.
In recent years Frieberg’s work has moved toward a freer and darker expression. The shift can be seen as a healthy refusal to stagnate, but also reads as a change in mental state during years marked by three spinal surgeries, heavy medication, and grueling rehabilitation. The darkness shows in a move away from clarity and beauty toward a more complex, less comforting aesthetic, as in F. 16, 19, Tone F3, Indian Ocean, where layers of paint transform the vivid patterns of coral fish into something much darker. Physically limited by the surgeries, Frieberg has been forced to work on a smaller scale than her previously often monumental pieces. As if refusing to accept the limitation, the painting stretches onto the frame, perhaps even beyond, out into the room, and up above the surface.
Elisabeth Frieberg (b. 1977, Sweden) lives and works in Stockholm. Her work has been exhibited at Galleri Thomas Wallner, Malmö (2025); Kewenig, Pied-à -terre, Berlin (2023); Hanige Konsthall (2021); MagasinIII Museum & Foundation for Contemporary Art, Stockholm (2017); Index – The Swedish ContemporaryArt Foundation, Stockholm (2016); Uppsala Konstmuseum, Uppsala (2015); and Fondazione Cini, Venice(2015), amongst other institutions. Her works are included in public collections such as the ModernaMuseet, Stockholm; Magasin III Museum & Foundation for Contemporary Art, Stockholm; The NationalPublic Art Council Sweden, and the Aguélimuseet, Sala.
