A central pillar of Daniel Lie’s artistic practice is time – ranging from age-old memories to the beginning of the world, from the life span of a human being to the geological time of the elements. Lie’s art explores concepts such as life, death, and decay, as well as biographical relationships and heritage, with an approach that centres around personal memories, family stories, cultural objects, and natural products that survive for a long time and are linked to memories of the past. Taking a lifetime as a comparative measure, the works are inspired by developmental processes and the transition from one state to another. Installations, sculptures, and a combination of different media reveal the performative qualities of the referential objects – time, transience, and presence. Lie turns a spotlight on these three aspects by creating complex installations and giving pride of place to organic elements that grow and age and have life cycles of their own, such as plants and fungi. Engaging in an interdisciplinary exchange with mycologists, archaeologists, and environmental specialists, Lie addresses the fault lines in binary thought patterns such as science and religion, past origins and present existence, life and death, while attempting to subvert them.
