VIVIAN SUTER IN SWEDEN, “LEVITY, FORTUITOUSNESS AND OPENNESS”
The exhibition I Am Godzilla at Moderna Museet Malmö is the Argentinan artist's first in Sweden, showcasing over 350 works, both new and older, many of which are being presented for the very first time.
Vivian Suter grew up in Switzerland and lives in Panajachel, Guatemala, since the early 1980s. Her painting is characterized by a physical and spontaneous process where nature serves as both inspiration and collaborator. Traces of leaves, twigs, and rainwater intermingle with the semi-abstract motifs in both muted and vibrant colors. With few exceptions, Suter's works are untitled and undated, reflecting an ongoing process of creation and transformation.
In the Malmö exhibition, Suter's paintings fill the Turbine Hall in a free and non-hierarchical manner. The organic installation serves as an extension of the artist's surroundings in Guatemala—an abstracted interpretation of her life and workspace.
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Vivian Suter. Installation view "I Am Godzilla", 2025. Photo: Helene Toresdotter/Moderna Museet
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Vivian Suter. No title (detail), Utan årtal/No date. Photo: Helene Toresdotter/Moderna Museet
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Vivian Suter. No title, Utan årtal/No date. Photo: Isabel Rotzler. Courtesy of the artist and Karma International, Zurich; Gladstone Gallery, New York and Brussels; House of Gaga, Mexico City and Los Angeles and Proyectos Ultravioleta, Guatemala City
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Vivian Suter. Installation view "I Am Godzilla", 2025. Photo: Helene Toresdotter/Moderna Museet
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Vivian Suter. No title, Utan årtal/No date. Photo: Isabel Rotzler. Courtesy of the artist and Karma International, Zurich; Gladstone Gallery, New York and Brussels; House of Gaga, Mexico City and Los Angeles and Proyectos Ultravioleta, Guatemala City
“A Vivian Suter exhibition is a sensory, site-specific experience in which time and place merge. The fact that circles are a recurring shape in her painting comes as no surprise. A shape without a clear beginning or end that is often found in nature. And despite the large number of paintings, a feeling of levity, fortuitousness and openness arises. There’s something meditative and repetitive in the blending of life, art and nature. At the same time, a distinct tenacity, perhaps even an obsession, emerges that also stresses that things have to be allowed to take the time they need,” explained Andreas Nilsson, curator at Moderna Museet Malmö.
Vivian Suter was born in Buenos Aires in 1949. Both exiled Europeans, her father owned a textile printing company in Buenos Aires, while her mother, Elisabeth Wild, was an artist. When Suter was twelve, the family moved to Basel, Switzerland, where she later studied painting. In 1982, shortly after her first large group exhibition at Kunsthalle Basel, she travelled through Latin America and settled in Panajachel, Guatemala, near Lake Atitlán, the following year.
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Vivan Suter's working space. Photo: Vivian Suter. Courtesy of Moderna Museet Malmö
Previous exhibition venues include: Kunstmuseum Olten, 2004, Kunsthalle Basel, 2014, São Paulo Biennial, 2014, documenta 14, Kassel and Athens, 2017, Power Plant, Toronto, 2018, The Art Institute of Chicago, 2019, Camden Art Centre, London, 2020, Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia, Madrid, 2021, Secession, Vienna, 2023, Museu de Arte, Arquitectura e Tecnologia Lissabon, 2024.
I am Godzilla will be on display until August 31, 2025, at Moderna Museet Malmö, Malmö, (Sweden).
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