Versus

The individual facing the ideal sculpture. The short life versus the long art.

In Versus Trine Søndergaard photographs the employees at Thorvaldsens Museum in Copenhagen together with the sculpture that they, by virtue of their daily walk at the museum, have each come to like the most.

The underlying idea is thus to provide a contemporary view of Thorvaldsen’s art through the employees’ subjective gaze and Trine Søndergaard’s objective. The people in the photographs are supervisors, curators, director, cleaning assistants, inspectors, clerks, school service staff, board members, student assistants, caretakers, office assistants, tour guides, etc.

By their different gender, age, appearance, background and position, they represent a cross-section of the population. So even though the work is based on a certain group’s relationship to art at the museum, it is of course more about modern man’s relationship to Thorvaldsen’s art.

The cover sleeve of the book folds out as a poster with one of Trine Søndergaard’s images from the series.