Charlotte Gyllenhammar: Disobedience, 1997
Two video works by Charlotte Gyllenhammar, Hang (2011) and Disobedience (1997), alternate on the ceiling of the entrance hall at the Stockholm School of Economics. Hang is shown from January 1 to June 30, and Disobedience from July 1 to December 31 each year. Together, the works function as a seasonal clock at the center of the building.
In both works, a woman appears suspended upside down with her face directed toward the camera, while the lower part of the body is concealed by flowing skirts.
Charlotte Gyllenhammar’s breakthrough came in 1993 with the work Die for You, an uprooted oak tree suspended upside down on Drottninggatan in central Stockholm. Throughout her career, Gyllenhammar has repeatedly returned to motifs of inversion and suspension. Turning figures and objects upside down is not only a visual strategy in her work, but also a way of exploring vulnerability, uncertainty, and altered perspectives.
The inverted figures can be understood as metaphors for fragility and loss of control, while also encouraging viewers to reconsider familiar realities from a different point of view.
Charlotte Gyllenhammar (born 1963 in Lerum, Sweden) is a Stockholm-based contemporary artist working across sculpture, installation, photography, and film. She studied at the Royal Institute of Art in Stockholm and the Royal College of Art in London.
Disobedience was donated to SSE by Alexandra Storåkers on the occasion of her 50th birthday as a contribution to the School’s shared spaces and in support of highlighting female artists.
“When I changed perspective and filmed the hanging woman from below, I was able to show her and protect her at the same time.”
— Charlotte Gyllenhammar