A conversation with gallerist Jonas Kleerup
“I was abroad studying architecture and similar stuff in Milan and London between 1998 and 2005. The last few years I also worked with set design, music production, antiquities, touring with bands and dDJing. I had a pretty fun life. Not much money though.”
Well-known on the Stockholm artsy club scene. Jonas Kleerup returned to Sweden some years ago. He had ideas and a vision and and alongside wine-filled nights in bars, he created a unique platform on the national art scene.
“When I moved back to Stockholm I felt something was lacking. I had never worked within the art industry before and didn’t know anyone, but I took a chance. In 2006 I opened up the gallery in a small venue, an old shop for women’s clothing dating back to the 1930’s. After a short while, people and artists discovered my very carefree attitude and collaborations started”.
The first show Jonas ever did was with filmmaker and artist Axel Petersén. After a year or two he moved further down the street of Tegnérgatan to a basement space with a New York-loft feeling.
Things were going well as buyers, curators and magazines started coming down and the shows got better and better, but there were dark clouds on the horizon. “We had a big dip due to the financial crisis from 2008 to2009 but in 2011, I moved to a venue near the Royal Opera and a year later I opened up a second space at Hudiksvallsgatan. Nowadays, times are lean again, so I don’t have any assistants anymore and just the one space by the Opera”.
We meet up close by, at Operabaren and order the house wines, Jonas gets the white Terre Fumées and I’m having a glass of a not-too-bad Montepulcino. I ask how he runs his gallery, situated at Jacobs Torg just across the street, and about his view on the current art scene.
“I just try to capture the times we are part of – that’s it basically. I’m very obsessed with the word contemporary and what our time, our generation is all about. I hope that’s reflected in the gallery. It’s the global thing going on, both physically and digitally. Art, artists, curators and galleries are traveling all over for new art fairs and biennales, while everyone’s also hoping for the internet as a new salvation. There are lots of new websites, both for trading and also for socializing with contemporary art as context. It’s quite fascinating. It’s like a traveling circus, a very enjoyable one.”
He returns to the global financial crisis that hit some years ago and its effect on the art scene. “Sweden was not hit as hard as other important hubs for contemporary art, but it hit us psychologically, so the gallery scene has noticed it more in the last two years. Buying is down and you don’t see that many new collectors stepping up on the scene. Also, since we are very influenced by what’s happening abroad we are indirectly following those that the crisis hit the hardest. We’re also seeing what happened in other countries, that the middle-scale institutions are disappearing, especially in the gallery scene. It’s being very big or very small.”
Jonas continues to DJ with his brother Andreas, sometimes swapping Swedish gigs for vodka-soaked trips to the east, but always returning to his gallery.
He tells me about his take on the connection between the love for wine and the art world.
“Wine has always been a bit pretentious. The art world as well, that’s why theygo so well together. A lot of artists live up to the cliché of red wine-sipping, torn souls. However, serving red wine at openings is not to be recommended. There’s always one slightly over-tipsy elderly soul who trips and believe me, red wine stains on the wall are not easy to get rid of. So white wine it is.”
Asking him about what drinks he prefers to serve up to his clients he explains. “I have had a good collaboration with a beer sponsor for many years so we’ve been serving that basically. Openings are for looking at the art and socializing, that’s my main focus, and, if I have some money, I don’t mind serving some Prosecco or champagne for early, important guests.”
Jonas is a fan of the French south coast, travelling there frequently. He loves the chilled, almost transparent and delicious rosé wine you can find everywhere there. “I think that’s where I first was allowed to have wine to accompany a meal. After that I think my brief period in the restaurant business when I was around 20 helped to improve my taste a bit. Then I moved abroad to Milan, which didn’t hurt the palette either”.
He always comes back to relax in the same place, right off Cap d’Antibes, between Antibes and Juan les Pins. “I like the atmosphere, the weather, the food, the sounds, the light and of course the scents of the coast – salty water, rosemary and lavender.,” he says, adding that there is plenty to do there too.
So, is it mostly cool rosés for this Côte d’Azur traveller in the arts or are there other poisons for him?
“I drink by the season. Autumn for light reds, winter for slightly heavier reds, spring is for whites and French rosé during the summer months. There are some grapes I’m not that into, and a few countries I like more than others. Everything moves in trends as well. At the moment I drink American, French and Italian wine the most.”
As a wine lover myself, I can’t help but to ask Jonas about his current wine status. Does he have any special bottles at home waiting for the right moment, or does he even have a moment of pure pleasure to share with us? His answer is frank and direct. “I have no wine collection. I don’t remember any particular bottle. I do however recall the taste of the delicious bottle of chardonnay from Jura I had last night with my sea bass at a local restaurant called Le Comptoir in the old town of Antibes”.
I ask Jonas about the other similarities between the worlds of wine and art. “Wine is filled with complexity, lots of nerdy info, taste making, subtleties, pretentiousness, lots of different local characteristics but overall there is a lot of similarities. Which is a lot like the art world”.
As the gallery season is up and running since early September, Jonas is now busy producing a lot of external shows. “We’re having Brooklyn painter, Noah Lyon, showing his “Internet paintings” in the gallery, then a few external shows at Riche, Pontus, Vassa Eggen and one pop-up gallery around Slussen with the designer Alexander Lervik. Then it’s off to Miami for the art fairs in December”.
This is what Jonas prefers from the Systembolaget shelves at this moment:
Joseph Drouhin, Bourgogne Aligote (nr. 5500, 101 kr)
Gitton, Sancerre, Les Belles Dames (nr. 2245, 149 kr)
Delinea 300, Pinot Noir, Sokol Blosser Oregon (nr. 6278, 99 kr)
Le Poiane, Valpolicella Ripasso, Bolla (nr. 22320, 115 kr)
Words by Pär Strömberg
