The seeminglysecretive, ultimately non-representational oeuvre of Swedish artist Sophie Tottie (*1964) eludes any clear interpretation. Working in a variety of media, she presents her paintings, photographs, and installations in different combinations or variations in each exhibition. Tottie works on flags, writing, symbols, and other abstract signs, providing her pieces with multilayered titles that open up a broad field of art historical connotations without conveying a clear meaning. Thus she deliberately keeps the viewer on the material and pictorial plane, emphasizes the application of color or graphic patterns, and attempts to prevent interpretation—the linguistic shift away from the painting itself—from being mixed up in the spontaneous reception of her art. In the best sense of l’art pour l’art, Tottie presents her work as a kind of theatrical play, whose presence and fleeting quality must be experienced through all of the senses.Exhibition schedule: Liljevalchs konsthall, Stockholm, April 14–May 27, 2007