Elin Odentia – VISION

We are pleased to present Elin Odentia’s third solo exhibition at the gallery, VISION, featuring a new series of paintings.

Odentia works in the space between figurative and abstract painting. Over the years, a shift towards abstraction has become evident through the reduction of shapes and outlines. In her new show, VISION—still distinctly recognisable as ‘Odentiesk’—the work features a softer colour palette with muted tones of blue, pink, yellow, and red. Often working in a portrait format, Odentia allows her motifs—structures and solid forms—to pose for the viewer.

In her acclaimed 2023 gallery exhibition Interlude (blue), Odentia explored motifs that appeared freed and elevated from the ground, in contrast to her earlier work. In VISION, her paintings depict objects both resting on the ground and floating in mid-air, suggesting different states of mind, agency, or time. The larger works are contrasted with miniature paintings, which bring a dynamic quality to the exhibition space and echo Odentia’s early fascination with icons, offering moments of intimacy and solitude between the viewer and the painting.

The exhibition title VISION refers to both Odentia’s creative process and the act of seeing. The gaze has always been a central element in her practice and in the experience of her work. Even the word VISION itself forms a shape that visually resonates with certain structures in her paintings—particularly in IV, which graphically resembles the title, as does Vision with its double “I”s.

In simplicity, we often find the strongest ideas and expressions—a reduced, concentrated form. For Odentia, such compositions come closest to her original vision—the visual idea—that typically emerges at the beginning of her process. In her evolving practice, gradual abstraction brings her work closer to a core or origin, imbuing it with a spiritual or religious dimension.

Elin Odentia (b. 1990 in Ödsmål) holds an MFA from the Royal Institute of Art, Stockholm and a BFA from University College of Arts, Craft & Design, Stockholm. Odentia has exhibited at Art Brussels, MARKET Art Fair, Liljevalchs konsthall, Stockholm, Uppsala Art Museum, Körbärsgården, Gotland, Galleri Thomassen, Gothenburg, Galleri Flach, Stockholm and Galleri 54, Gothenburg. She was awarded the scholarship of Anna-Lisa Thomson Till Minne foundation in 2019 and the Swedish Arts Grants Committee’s working grants in 2020, 2022 and 2024. She is represented in the collections of Uppsala Art Museum, Ståhl Collection, Public Art Agency Sweden, Stockholm konst, Region Uppsala, Region Kalmar län, Region Dalarna, Uppsala Municipality, Swedish Association for Art (SAK) and Vinge Art Collection, as well as important private American and Italian collections.