Saaret vilddyr (Wounded Beast I). 1950-1953.
Oil on fibreboard.
Signed, dated, titled and inscribed with the artist's address on the reverse. 61.5 x 41 cm (24.2 x 16.1 in).

• The declared aim of the artist group “CoBrA”, which Jorn co-founded in 1948, was to increase spontaneity and expressivity in art and to challenge the artistic supremacy of Paris.
• The wild, spontaneous technique integrates the process of creation and the material into the composition.
• In his early works, Asger Jorn found inspiration in the ornamental forms of Viking art, in medieval Danish frescoes and Scandinavian folk art.

PROVENANCE: Private collection Norway (since 2012).

LITERATURE: Guy Atkins, Asger Jorn, Jorn in Scandinavia 1930-1953, London 1968, catalogue raisonné no. 717.
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Arne Bruun Rasmussen, Copenhagen, auction on June 12, 2012, lot 771.
Ingrid Schjoldager (ed.), The Narud Collection, Oslo 2021 (illu. in color on pp. 23 and 107).

"Fairy tales and myths have monsters, fantastic beings and symbols that people have crafted from real phenomena. [..] We should not give descriptions of men as animals. But we should describe ourselves as animals. That is our way."
Asger Jorn in a letter to Constant, 1950 (quoted from: Uwe M. Schneede, Cobra 1948-51, ex. cat. Kunstverein Hamburg, Hamburg 1982, p. 138).