Jim Thorell "Angel Shots" | SETAREH Vernissage

In the organizer's words:

Jim Thorell
Angel Shots
September 11 - October 25, 2025

Opening Reception
Thursday, September 11, 2025
6-9 PM
SETAREH Berlin, Schöneberger Ufer 71, Berlin

SETAREH is excited to announce our fourth solo exhibition of Jim Thorell, Angel Shots, at Schöneberger Ufer 71, Berlin. The exhibition takes place in correspondence with the 2025 Berlin Art Week. You are warmly invited to join us on Thursday, September 11, from 6-9 pm to celebrate the new works in person.

Angel Shots presents a new series of works in which Jim Thorell rethinks global ideologies through painting. He excavates the underlying foundation of these structures through the use of forms, both breaking them down and developing them past their intended limits. With an expression that is legible as a language of its own, Thorell reveals that there is still so much to learn about the world as we know it.

Thorell describes angel shots as, "A shot of the water the angel made. Jam packed with growth in all its monstrous glory." He uses angel shots as a shorthand. A quiet cry for something that carries a much bigger potential than its small container. The artworks in the exhibition operate in a similar way. Jam packed, exploding with colors and rich details, they become more than what their 'container' should seemingly allow.

In Jim Thorell's new works, are we looking at a giant world from afar, or are we looking at a close-up image of a microcosm? Angel Shots takes our ultra-globalized and progressive world and cycles back to the root of origin. Kaleidoscopic or - microscopic - spontaneous combustion. The fantasy in Thorell's paintings is not a paradoxical expression of superfluity. But rather, the fantasy is for a world where less can be more. Power can be found in things as small as a shot glass.

The opening reception of Angel Shots will be from 6-9 pm, Schöneberger Ufer 71, at SETAREH Berlin on Thursday, September 11, 2025. We are looking forward to seeing you there.

The Arist:

Jim Thorell lives and works in Stockholm after having studied a Master of Fine Arts at Valand Academy in Gothenburg, Sweden in 2010. He had previously also studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna, Kanazawa University in Japan, and the Vietnam University of Fine Arts in Hanoi. He has been featured in group and solo exhibitions including Tidepools at LOYAL in Stockholm (2024),The Great Longing - The Act of Painting at Sweden's Bohusläns Museum (2019), the Nordic Contemporary Art Collection in Norway (2017), and Painting Failures at the Moderna Museet in Stockholm (2016). Thorell is also part of multiple private and public collections including Statens konstråd, the National Arts Council Collection in Sweden.

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German

Jim Thorell
Angel Shots
11.9.-25.10.2025

Vernissage
Thursday, September 11, 2025
6-9 pm
Schöneberger Ufer 71, Berlin

SETAREH is pleased to present Jim Thorell's fourth solo exhibition titled Angel Shots at Schöneberger Ufer 71 in Berlin. The exhibition will take place during Berlin Art Week 2025.

Angel Shots presents a new series of works in which Jim Thorell painterly questions global ideologies - such as the contrast between capitalism and degrowth. In his works, he reveals the structural foundations of these systems by both deconstructing them and developing them beyond their usual boundaries. Using a mode of expression that functions as a language of its own, Thorell makes it clear that there is still much to learn about the world as we think we know it.

The title of the exhibition refers to a social practice: in bars, an "Angel Shot" can be ordered as a silent call for help - a code word with which guests can inconspicuously turn to the staff if they feel uncomfortable or threatened. By referencing a drink that doesn't actually exist, Thorell uses the idea of theAngel Shot to connect to other concepts - ones that also have no physical body and yet have a real effect in our world.

Thorell describes "Angel Shots" as "a shot from the water that the angel made. Packed with growth in all its monstrous glory." He uses "Angel Shots" as a kind of shorthand - a quiet call for something that holds much more potential than its small vessel suggests. With the description, Thorell does what only artists can do: Conjure up an image with just a few words, bursting with meaning and associations. The works in the exhibition function in a similar way. They are overflowing - exploding with color and rich in detail - and go beyond the scope of what their "vessels" should actually hold.

Thorell is equally fascinated by the ideas of escapism and the degrowth movement - two strands that run through the exhibition like a double helix. On the one hand, the opulent paintings distract from everything outside the picture. They act as a tunnel of escape: an invitation to lose oneself in another reality. A 'chromadex' of fantastic colors creates a world that is as complex as it is beguilingly constructed. On the other hand, degrowth stands for the conscious rejection of the wasteful by-products of capitalist societies. Degrowth is not a recession, but a return. Just like Thorell's paintings, we also show: We are more than what a limited world believes us to be - a world in which constant growth is not always liberating, but can also be constricting.

In Jim Thorell's new works, are we looking at a huge world from afar or at a close-up of a microcosm? During the process of creating the works on display, Thorell was inspired by Prometheus, in which an extraterrestrial being creates humanity by fertilizing a mountain stream. Angel Shots takes our ultra-globalized, progress-driven world and leads it back to its origins. Kaleidoscopic - or microscopic - spontaneous combustion. The fantasy in Thorell's painting is not a paradoxical excess. Rather, it dreams of a world in which less can be more. Just as a quiet stream gives rise to new life, something as small as a shot glass has an unexpected power.