Aller Media

Carl and Laura Aller first established Aller Media in 1897, and today 5 generations later, Aller remains family company. Aller Media is one of the largest media companies in Scandinavia, and publish more than 20 notable magazines and newspapers in Norway alone. In March of 2015 the Norwegian branch of Aller Media moved into a new 11 000 m2 building in Nydalen, Oslo. The modern building is designed for an even better work environment, which allows the team to work closer together across all departments in order to provide power for innovation and growth.

The focus on the media industry has therefor been of great importance in selections of artists, as well as the new architectural preconditions. For the public lounge area, the painting Essence II (2014) by the artist Christer Glein stretches out 4 meters on one of the extensive walls. The work signifies the artists’ way of working with the formal distinction between realism and abstraction. On the vast surface of the canvas, Glein plays with the potential of painting itself, in layers upon layers of bright colors in light brushstrokes and hard-edged geometric shapes.

Fredrik Raddum is recognized for his sculptures and installation art, and has made a monumental piece for the public lounge area of the Aller building. The installation is shaped as a baby cot mobile with hanging sculptures resembling a dystopian cartoon. Its various levitations creates a visual experience for the entire business stationed different floors.

The sculptures varies from clouds, pillows, diamonds and cake, to a bonfire, gun, a ghost and a naked earth with only one remaining tree. With his seemingly harmless works, he addresses different themes, which shows how media culture can move hastily between existentialist and political subjects, to topics of shallow commercials and humorous issues.

Each of Sverre Bjertnæs’ artworks are a new discovery equipped with its own codes and instruments, an exciting artistic style that both stays true to classical figuration, as well as experimenting with expressionism and conceptualism.

The painting Ben Allals Selvportrett (2014) shows a replication of a self-portrait Allal painted of himself. Bjertnæs has taken a special interest in his character, and has portrayed him up to several times in different works. Allal is often mixed up with Ben Allal the prisoner, famous for escaping jail several times, a myth he has taken great advantage of in creating his own artistic identity. Like the original painting, Allal holds a beautiful woman in his arms. Bjertnæs has symbolically separated the two with different colors in the portrait, but also by the difference in their physical features. The glossy surface of resin gives the painting a feeling of being as fake as plastic, which it is.