SOMMERSOLHVERV SALON
Sommersolhver Salon, a group exhibition for SIC │ Sharing is Caring, featuring three distinct artists, Bolatta Silis-Høegh (GL), Lasse Bech Martinussen (DK), Helga Páley (IS).
Sommersolhver Salon
At the summer solstice, the light pauses for a moment. The day reaches its peak, nature unfolds in full force, and colours vibrate in the warmth of summer.
At SIC │ Sharing is Caring, the longest day of the year is marked with Summer Solstice Salon: an exhibition where light, body, and consciousness merge in a sensory space on Vesterbro.
Three freelance curators, Malou Solfjeld, Josephine Fity, and Anna Fernsten Nilén, have each invited one artist to this group exhibition. Their collaboration began with the first Solstice Salon in December, where works by more than 25 artists were installed within just 24 hours. With Summer Solstice Salon, the dialogue continues in a more concentrated format, allowing three distinct artistic practices to unfold.
The three artists, Bolatta Silis-Høegh, Helga Páley Friðþjófsdóttir, and Lasse Bech Martinussen, all approach painting as a space for exploring colour, form, and inner states. Across their practices, the exhibition revolves around the body, being, and the subconscious.
In the work of Bolatta Silis-Høegh, the body is both sender and receiver. Her paintings emerge from emotion, held through repetition and gesture, where warm, earthy tones and circular movements create a rhythm between vulnerability, care, and strength—between body and nature. Helga Páley Friðþjófsdóttir unfolds a vibrant, fluid universe in which light moves through organic forms, and the recognizable dissolves into dreamlike abstraction. Her works appear as sensory landscapes, balancing between memory and imagination. In the paintings of Lasse Bech Martinussen, the male figure emerges in intense colours and quiet reflection. Through his series Thinking Men, he explores the nuances of masculinity and the tension between the masculine and feminine within introspective states.
Summer Solstice Salon reflects the energy of the sun as both an external and internal phenomenon, a moment of stillness and intensity, where perception and presence are heightened.
Bolatta Silis-Høegh is a visual artist of Greenlandic and Latvian heritage, based in Copenhagen and working across Greenland, Denmark, and Sweden. Her multidisciplinary practice spans visual art, installation, and children’s literature, exploring questions of identity, culture, place, and the future.
She graduated from Aarhus Academy of Art in 2006 and has since exhibited extensively in Denmark, Greenland, and internationally. Her installation Greenlandic Future Garden (2010) was awarded by the Danish Arts Council, while Ningiu (2012) was presented at the Danish Pavilion at the Venice Architecture Biennale.
In parallel with her visual art practice, Silis-Høegh is an author and illustrator of children’s books. Her first book, Aima (2011), was followed by Aima Shush! (2015), which was nominated for the Nordic Council Children and Young People’s Literature Prize in 2016. Her solo exhibitions Lights On Lights Off (2015) and STORM (2016) toured the Nordic region. Her work has been featured by The Huffington Post, Moore Women’s Artists, and ARoS Public, among others.
Helga Páley Friðþjófsdóttir (b. 1987) is a Reykjavík-based visual artist whose practice centres on painting. Working through form, colour, and texture, she develops images intuitively through a process of layering, scraping, and reworking. Her paintings emerge slowly, allowing narratives and associations to take shape through repetition and experimentation.
She graduated from the Iceland University of the Arts in 2011 and has exhibited extensively in Iceland and internationally. Recent solo exhibitions include Loaded Beach at Akureyri Art Museum (2025), Velvet Curtains at Listval (2024), and Janitor’s Big Hit at Þula (2021). Her work has also been presented at Reykjavík Art Museum, The Living Art Museum, and Alice Folker Gallery in Copenhagen, as well as in Berlin, Basel, Helsinki, and Stockholm. She participated in CHART Art Fair, Copenhagen, in 2025.
Her practice also includes artist residencies and artist-run initiatives, including TAXI Residency in Denver, Kunstschlager Gallery, and Sequences – Real Time Art Festival.
Photo credit : Jan Søndergaard
Lasse Bech Martinusen (b. 1979) is a Copenhagen-based artist and photographer working at the intersection of painting and photography. His practice combines watercolor, acrylic, and oil pastel in an expressive, sensory exploration of portraiture.
With the series Thinking Men (2019–), he investigates contemporary male identities in the tension between vulnerability and strength, the masculine and the feminine. Inspired by both classical sculpture and popular culture, he depicts figures in states of reflection and introspection.
His works have been exhibited in Denmark and internationally, including in the USA. In parallel, he works as a photographer for clients such as Kinfolk, Monocle, Wallpaper, and WIRED. His photography is represented in the collection of Brandts Art Museum.