Fakewhale in Dialogue with Matteo Cantarella
On the occasion of this conversation with Matteo Cantarella, founder of the eponymous gallery in Copenhagen, we delve into the path that led him to open his exhibition space, the curatorial vision that shapes his programming, and the challenges of today’s contemporary art landscape. This dialogue offers a glimpse into an independent project driven by ongoing research and constant exchange with artists, audiences, and institutions.
How did your journey into the art world begin, and what led you to open your own gallery in Copenhagen in 2022?
My path has been shaped by many influences that I still see reflected in my work today. I have a background in economics, but I’ve always had a strong interest in literature and philosophy. Thinkers like Franco “Bifo” Berardi, Byung-Chul Han, Donna Haraway, Maggie Nelson, and Paul B. Preciado have deeply informed many of my questions and interests.
After working for many years in galleries, I decided in 2022 to open a space in my apartment in Copenhagen. Copenhagen simply happens to be the city where I’ve been living since 2016, a place I’ve always appreciated for its strong public support of culture and its vibrant international art scene. My only real ambition in opening the space was to reconnect with my work, to explore the questions that felt most urgent to me, and to discover new ones through the work of artists I didn’t yet know or whose practice I felt deserved greater visibility.
After about a year of exhibitions, I chose to evolve the project into a commercial gallery, opening a permanent space and formalizing long-term collaborations with the artists.
What curatorial vision guides your program?
From the very beginning, I made the decision to work primarily with queer artists and women artists, whose work I found often marginalized, especially within the commercial art world I came from. The program is deeply concerned with reflections on the human condition, both in its public and private spheres, the conditions of artistic labor, and the complex intersections between nature, capitalism, and technology.
Your gallery has hosted several critically ambitious exhibitions. How do you conceive and develop a show?
A common thread in my projects is the desire to explore a particular aspect or experience within an artist’s practice, often resulting in site-specific exhibitions or opportunities to work with unconventional formats. In Therese Bülow’s recent exhibition, Swing Pattern Gone, for example, the artist presented an installation of linen works, grown, processed, and woven by the artist herself over a three-year period, culminating in the show. The project aimed to investigate the social, material, and economic conditions tied to production processes that have largely been forgotten today, having become fully automated and impersonal.
Although each project follows a different path, it’s important for me to remain deeply involved on a personal level. Among the many roles I take on, writing critical texts for the exhibitions is often part of the process, a moment of reflection that remains essential to my practice.
Is there an exhibition, perhaps a recent one, that has held particular personal significance for you?
A very meaningful recent exhibition was Keywords: A Vocabulary of Culture and Society, the first solo show of Maryam Jafri in Copenhagen, where the artist has lived since the early 2000s. Despite her international recognition, she has had relatively few appearances in Scandinavia, and it was a real pleasure to work on this exhibition with an artist of such an accomplished and established career. The exhibition takes its title from Raymond Williams’ 1976 publication of the same name and was conceived at a moment when language is once again under attack by reactionary forces, both online and offline, seeking to strip it of meaning, rendering it incapable of articulating or clarifying any shared sense of reality.
(Keywords: A Vocabulary of Culture and Society by Maryam Jafri is on view until May 31st, 2025.
https://www.matteocantarella.net/exhibitions/jafri-keywords
How important is collaboration (with local institutions, curators, other galleries) in your work?
Collaboration and dialogue are truly at the core of our work, with artists, colleagues, audiences, institutions, and collectors alike.
Recently, together with a group of other commercial galleries, artist-run spaces, and project spaces, we joined a new initiative called Under, Festival for Art Spaces, organized by SIMIAN in Copenhagen and curated by Nikolaj Stobbe and Fafaya Mogensen. The format combines a group exhibition, workshops, performances, and a talk program. These kinds of collaborative moments are what can plant the seeds of change, helping us reclaim a sense of agency and urgency in what we do, both collectively and individually.
Could you tell us about the role of experimentation within your program? Have you ever conceived particularly unconventional or “offbeat” projects?
In some way, I feel that each exhibition tries to gesture toward that uncharted horizon, toward something unconventional or “off the beaten path.”
One project that stands out in this sense was Danish artist Sofie Winther’s solo exhibition in 2023. Exploring ideas of subordination and dependency between individuals and systems, the artist presented an installation of everyday objects that reflected our experience of the public sphere. A blackboard, for instance, which immediately evokes notions of discipline, authority, and the production of subjectivity as conditioned by the educational system. Dysfunctional paper towel dispensers were transformed into purely aesthetic objects, and the installation was completed by a spiral of plastic ants, introducing an additional layer of dissonance and disobedience.
How do you see the role of the gallery evolving in today’s contemporary art landscape? Between social media, emerging art fairs, and generational shifts in collecting, what is a gallery today for you, and how has its role changed compared to the past?
As the opportunities to operate within increasingly mediated and digital contexts continue to expand, I find it even more important to preserve the physical and local dimension of the gallery. The gallery thrives on relationships, many of which are born precisely from the conversations and reflections we share daily with artists, colleagues, collectors, and the visitors who come through our doors.
While art fairs remain important for positioning the work of our artists and for supporting the need to reach new markets and collectors, they also run the risk of becoming an end in themselves rather than a tool, often overshadowing the slower, more meaningful work of dialogue and dissemination that originates from our spaces.
Can you tell us what you are currently working on and what we can expect from your program in the coming months?
This year marks an important continuation for the gallery. On one hand, we are strengthening collaborations with artists who first began working with the gallery in 2022. Therese Bülow, whose second solo exhibition has just recently concluded, and Frederikke Jul Vedelsby, who will return to the gallery this August with a solo presentation and a new video work.
At the same time, the program is expanding to include artists who are exhibiting in Copenhagen for the first time, including Maryam Jafri, Sanna Helena Berger, and Stella Sieber, who will open her first solo exhibition at the gallery this November.
fakewhale
Founded in 2021, Fakewhale advocates the digital art market's evolution. Viewing NFT technology as a container for art, and leveraging the expansive scope of digital culture, Fakewhale strives to shape a new ecosystem in which art and technology become the starting point, rather than the final destination.
You may also like
NFTs and the World Wide Web: Parallel or Divergent Paths?
As we navigate the complex landscape of digital innovation, it becomes evident that technological ad
The Reflection of Dawn: Exploring the Interior and Exterior in Carissa Rodriguez’s Motherhood
“Entering an exhibition is like crossing the threshold of a dream,” once wrote the art c
Dance with Innocence – Meet Rocco Gallo
Introducing Rocco Gallo Artist: Rocco Gallo – Birthplace: Mombasa, Kenya, 1991 – Living
