EURYDICE (115)

A veil of smoke drifts through the space. Three monumental sculptures emerge from the mist, each capturing a different moment from the tragic myth of Orpheus and Eurydice.
Bathed in blue the exhibition seems at first to offer a vision of romance: soft surfaces, intimate gestures, bodies reaching for one another. But the closer we look, the less certain the scene becomes. Somewhere between desire and unease, heaven and Hades begin to blur.

In EURYDICE, Sif Itona Westerberg revisits the ancient myth of Orpheus, who descends into the underworld to bring his beloved Eurydice back from the dead. Moved by Orpheus’ music, Hades agrees to release Eurydice on one condition: Orpheus must not turn to look at her until they have both reached the world of the living. But just before they emerge, he looks back, and Eurydice is lost to him forever.

Traditionally told as the tragedy of a man losing his beloved, Westerberg’s retelling shifts the perspective towards Eurydice. Rather than a passive figure defined by her disappearance, she emerges as a subject in her own right. She has trusted Orpheus enough to follow him into the unknown, yet he cannot extend the same trust to her. His need to see, to know, to be certain, ultimately destroys the very thing he wishes to preserve. In Westerberg’s interpretation, Eurydice turns towards him not with longing or despair, but with a look of disappointment and contempt.

Alongside the monumental sculptures, eleven smaller reliefs explore the fragile boundary between tenderness and intrusion. Hands intertwine, fingers press into flesh, bodies reach towards and merge with one another. A touch becomes an imprint; an embrace threatens to become a grip. These intimate gestures reveal a paradox: the harder we try to hold on to something, the more we risk altering its very nature.

Through these works, the myth unfolds into a broader reflection on our desire to understand the world around us. While scientific inquiry has given us extraordinary insight, our reliance on evidence and explanation leaves less room for intuition, for sensing rather than knowing.

Just as Orpheus loses Eurydice in his attempt to confirm her presence, what might be lost in our pursuit of certainty? EURYDICE explores the tension between knowing and sensing, between the desire to understand and the willingness to leave room for and trust in what we cannot know.

The exhibition is the first solo exhibition at Andersen’s by Sif Itona Westerberg.

About the artist:
Sif Itona Westerberg (b. 1985) graduated from the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts in 2014. She primarily works with sculpture, reliefs, and large-scale installations. One of her most frequently used materials is aerated concrete, which she carefully carves to bring her motifs to life. Drawing great inspiration from classical mythology, Itona Westerberg explores new ecologies, relationships between humans and other species, as well as technology and aesthetics in the Anthropocene.

Westerberg has held major solo exhibitions at the Driehaus Museum (USA), ARoS, Tranen, Gether Contemporary, and OK Corral, as well as participating in the ARoS Triennial. She has also exhibited in group exhibitions both in Denmark, including at ARKEN Museum of Contemporary Art, Malmö Art Museum, Den Frie, the Museum of Religious Art, Bornholm Art Museum, and Oluf Høst Museum, and internationally at Gianni Manhattan (Austria), Cassandra Cassandra (Canada), PERMM Museum of Contemporary Art (Russia), the Latvian Centre for Contemporary Art (Latvia), and the State Museum and Exhibition Center ROSIZO (Russia).

Westerberg's permanent artwork for Frederiksberg Church, Sennepsfrøet, was inaugurated in 2026. She is also the artist behind the statuette Før Kastet, awarded as part of the King and Queen’s Awards, as well as the international music and science award, the Daphne Prize.

Itona Westerberg’s works are held in the collections of ARoS, Brandts, Malmö Art Museum, and the Museum of Religious Art.