Biography

Camilla Thorup was born in Denmark where she also lives and works today. She has from early childhood been drawing and painting. In 2008 she graduated form The Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Copenhagen with a Master of Fine Arts.
Over the last few years Thorup also started working three-dimensionally and she is now making sculptures in ceramics, bronze, and concrete. Thorup has also curated and co-curated gallery shows and museums exhibition. Her work has been shown in museums, galleries and art institutions in Denmark and abroad .

Artist statement

The driving force behind my work is an interest in human beings and the human psyche as it is expressed through the timeless stories, we as human beings have in common. My motifs are often figures of animals and people. In the starting phase I work intuitively and try to keep my inner critic at bay. Come what may. During this process I want to leave the door ajar to the subconscious; to a world where logic, gravity and rationality are not in power. I strive at creating a playful arena where the figures materialize and get a voice of their own where magic, symbolism and narratives are free to unfold . 

This has resulted in a series of figures who are interacting in multiple ways. They keep each other buckled down, they perform balancing acts, and they carry one another. The personality of the figures border stereotypes. As a rule, they are not defined by age, class, nationality, or time, but transcend various groups that exist in our society, and in that way, I hope to convey a belief in a strengthened bond and acceptance between humans. 

I want to invite those who watch my work to take my figures by the hand and be led on a journey through life, through a saga of human relations and the contradictions in life. These are dualistic narratives where there is a pendulum motion between concepts such as play and seriousness, strength and fragility, love and loneliness and inevitably, stories about death and the transformation into something else.