Name: Mette Mygland
Year of birth: 1959
Nationality: Norwegian
Profession/title: Artist
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Life and encounters with the people I meet are my inspirations.
Mette Mygland (1959) is an ‘explorer’. Audacity and brutal intimacy air a provocative veracity in her paintings, drawings, collages, and installations. With a rapturous yet troubling palette she exposes internal affliction with a focus on through the eternal female body. Physical experiences such as childbirths, milk ejection breast, confronting spread legs explore pain, taboos, and human receptivity. Existential nonconsenting interrogations becomes inquiries into the psychological sceneries and memories of the female mind and its physical representations.
Mygland started her artistic exploration at the age of 46. Her art has been presented in both solo and group exhibitions. She was recently selected for the opening exhibition of the National Museum in Norway.
Photo credit: Tonje Gulbæk
CO: What is the most important drive for you to create and why?
MM: The need to express myself artistically is strong. I am not very good expressing myself with words. Painting, drawing, sculpture, and installations are my means of expression.
CO: Who or what do you value as a great inspiration for you creatively?
MM: Life and encounters with the people I meet are my inspirations.
CO: What’s your first artistic memory?
MM: For Christmas one year, I guess I was 14–15-year-old, I got a calendar with aquarelles by Munch. They were so beautiful, and I was so happy that I cried.
CO: Can you elaborate on a moment in your life where you experienced a change which altered your way of thinking or your approach to creativity ?
MM: I was 13 years old when my brother at 18 died in a car accident. This changed me and impacted my life.
CO: What do you consider your greatest achievement?
MM: It was a big moment for me when to be selected for the National Autumn Art Exhibition.
CO: What is your idea of perfect happiness?
MM: Happiness is a strong word. And perfect happiness?
The feeling when my children was born. The awful pain. The fear. And then when it was over. Nothing painful. Only happiness when the children was placed in my arms, and everything was fine.
CO: What is your most treasured possession?
MM: My paintbrush.
What harsh truths do you prefer to ignore?
MM: What is the truth really?
CO: What do you aspire to? In the near future? In life in general?
MM: My wish is to be able to create as long as I have the health to do so. And to stay healthy I need to create.
CO: Which young artists have impressed you?
MM: Many. I prefer not to name anyone in particular.
The exhibition is sponsored by Adam&Eva and Oslo Kommune.
