Søren Behncke - Candle with Hare

Søren Behncke (b. 1967) - also known as Papfar - has developed his very own visual universe based on many quirky and thought-provoking actions in public space, filled with humour, attitudes, symbols, visual language flowers - and a wild fascination with cardboard!

For many years, Søren Behncke has been fascinated by all kinds of cardboard packaging. That is, the cardboard boxes that usually become waste the moment they lose their contents and are nothing but a nuisance and something no one wants to recognise. Seen through Behncke's eyes, the waste products of consumerism - stamped with all kinds of product names and simple graphic signs - offer an abundance of artistic opportunities. He seizes these opportunities in his quirky, anti-authoritarian and humorous way.

CANDLE WITH HARE is Søren Behncke's first major exhibition with representative works from his entire artistic production. The exhibition includes the tractor, of course, but also his Ladies Tools series of oversized pink power tools, as well as the thought-provoking sign-like works and his cardboard version of the national treasure, the Golden Horns.

Behncke's whimsically twisted play with reality is also evident in the exhibition's many paintings and drawings, which also make extensive use of humble materials. Søren Behncke is inspired by the street art and graffiti culture that can be experienced in modern urban life. However, while the latter often focuses on provocation and a political message, Behncke's work is primarily about humour and communication, about challenging and putting things into perspective, about opening eyes and creating a dialogue between art and reality. Søren Behncke is now also travelling the world.

Over the summer he has been in New York, where he carried out a series of actions at well-known locations in the city. One of the actions involved the famous H.C. Andersen statue - here, of course, made of cardboard and with a winding screw in the back - in Central Park.

The curator of the exhibition was Mona Jensen.

The exhibition was sponsored by Aage & Ulla Filtenborg's Foundation of 8 November and Lanng's Emballage A/S.

Søren Behncke's choice of material is both unusual and unconventional. Cardboard is a standard commodity that in itself has no particular artistic value or status. But with consummate craftsmanship and a play with image and word metaphors, he transforms the cardboard into an artistic expression that creates space for a number of existential considerations. With a unified expression, he renews and challenges the usual conventions of the art institution. The work titles refer directly to the numbers, letters, words, pictograms and other motifs - often drawn from the caricatured world of comics - that make up his works. They are ambiguous, but always hold the key to understanding or interpreting the individual work.

This is not the first time Søren Behncke has been inside ARoS. In 2005, under the guise of a pretend stag party, he snuck a huge cardboard slingshot into Boy - Ron Mueck's large sculpture.

"The purpose of the slingshot was to give the lonely boy something to play with," says the artist. Søren Behncke made a name for himself in the Danish art world when he exhibited a 1:1 scale Ferguson tractor made entirely of cardboard, glue and tape at V1 Gallery in Copenhagen in 2005. The spectacular piece was bought for Novo Nordisk by then CEO, art lover Mads Øvlisen. Since then Søren Behncke has participated in a large number of exhibitions and is now in 2008 making his entrance on the international art scene.