Danish painter born in Copenhagen in 1957. He has lived and worked in Barcelona since 1994. His conceptual expression is rooted in the naturalism of the Danish Golden Age — he was referred to as “Eckersberg’s pupil in the 1980s” — and especially in Christen Købke. Painters such as Vermeer and Hammershøi are also among his influences; their ways of conceiving light continue to inspire him more than ever.

Throughout his career, he has experimented with the fusion of realism and abstraction, which has become the very core of his artistic project: Introspective Naturalism and Divided United Reality are expressions coined to convey this content.

The constant division and unification of the image create a permanent interaction between continuity and discontinuity, describing different moods and sensations of time, whose ultimate expression, Simultaneous Perception, leads to relief structures. The concepts of Contrapuntal Realism and Multiversal Realism have been central to his most recent works. Both focus on visual perception itself and require an active gaze from the viewer — a simultaneous perception.

These concepts contain the realization of how the complexity of reality challenges artistic articulation in the 21st century. In the field of pure painting, this should be considered as a parallel expression to that of Peter Greenaway in film and video art.

Physant also applies these concepts to portraiture, which has always occupied a central place in his work, as he has been drawing portraits from live models since the age of 13. In portraiture, he seeks humanity and the unconscious in order to compose the complete work.

In 2015, he painted the portrait of H.M. Queen Margrethe II of Denmark, commissioned by the Museum of National History of Denmark, where it is currently on display. Among his most recent portraits are: H.R.H. Princess Benedikte of Denmark, Annie & Otto Detlefs, Ib Kunoe, and W. Schwartz, Grand Master of Freemasonry in Denmark.

Physant finds great inspiration in music, poetry, psychology and literature. He has illustrated the Danish and Norwegian editions of Tree & Leaf by J.R.R. Tolkien, the original works of which were exhibited in numerous venues across Scandinavia. He has created works for two books on Rome: 40 watercolours for Rome, City of Squares and 19 for A Glimpse of a Forgotten Rome, resulting in several exhibitions in Denmark inspired by the Mediterranean. In 2014, he created 28 works to illustrate the Danish edition of the poetry book FERIAS by Federico García Lorca, translated by Inge and Klaus Rifbjerg, which were exhibited at the Federico García Lorca Birthplace Museum in Granada, Spain, and at the Vendsyssel Museum of Art in Denmark.

The Vendsyssel Kunstmuseum houses his self-portrait, which is a painted interpretation of Carl Nielsen’s Second Symphony, Opus 16, The Four Temperaments.

In 2017, Lars Physant was appointed Knight of the Order of the Dannebrog — Ridder af Dannebrogordenen — by H.M. Queen Margrethe II of Denmark.

Danish Art Associations