Myopia is Morten Qvale’s second exhibition at Qvale Gallery, which was established in 2013. The two central themes featured in this exhibition are Natural Beauty and Man-made Landscapes, subjects Morten has worked with for years. He has also shown a great interest in traditional landscapes.

The theme in Natural Beauty are nudes, one of the oldest genres within photography, which has engaged many famous photographers. Morten’s pictures find themselves within this classical repertoire, whilst showing us a very high degree of a personal approach to the subjects, as well as the sublime technical qualities inherent in his work. The skin-tones in his nudes portray a marble-like inner glow, which at times draws similarities to Robert Mapplethorpe’s nude studies. Morten’s nudes are undoubtedly some of the finest examples we have seen in Norwegian photography.

The exhibition’s second theme, Man-made Landscapes, places itself into a more modern and documentary-style tradition, where many photographers have tried to capture how the expansion of civilization has affected and re-formed naturally existing landscapes. Morten’s approach is in a more artistic manner; he depicts the chaotic architecture of the cityscapes by placing them alone and thus creating an exciting aesthetic composure. Morten often uses a composite technique where numerous separate exposures are merged together into one. By doing so, one achieves a wonderfully sharp and detailed picture, which could not have been done in one single shot alone. This technique requires a profound set of technical skills, and here Morten does all the work by himself, including the printing of the large formats these compositions demand. His monumental sizes however are printed in a specialized lab in London.

Morten is one of Norway’s most renowned photographers who specialises in commercial fashion and advertising photography. Also, he is one of the very few Norwegian photographers working internationally; he has had large commissions for clients like Adidas, Oscar De La Renta, Reebok and Jordache. His work has been published in Vanity Fair, Elle, L’Officiel and Schön. He has worked with numerous famous models like Claudia Schiffer, Helena Christensen and Anna Nicole Smith – and also celebrities like Donald Sutherland and Calvin Klein. As Morten is multi-artistic, he has also directed numerous commercials and music videos.

In 2013 Morten founded Qvale Gallery, a bold but successful commitment. The gallery is one of the nicest in Oslo and completely devoted to fine art photography, which has become very much in vogue; there is a growing tendency and interest in viewing and collecting photography in Norway. Morten’s international contacts have proven good assets; the second show held at the gallery was an exhibition with non less then Albert Watson. Additionally Morten emphasizes that the gallery also wants to show Norwegian photography, which signals a very positive attitude. We have wanted a photographical hub in Oslo for a long time, and Qvale Gallery has the opportunity to achieve this.

Morten’s career has been a successful one, although his entrance into the photographical trade was rather untraditional. He was educated as a typographer and was well versed within the magazine printing business, and then soon after the fashion world. In 1983 he founded a fashion magazine called Tique, which would go on to become a gigantic success. Morten started off as editor in chief, where he hired some of the world’s foremost fashion photographers to shoot for the magazine. He managed too commission masters like French Guy Bourdin and English Terence Donovan; a truly incredible achievement which made Tique famous beyond Norwegian borders. This inspired him further. It was around this time that Morten picked up the camera; he seized every opportunity to learn from the master photographers whom he hired to shoot for the magazine. Photographers like Bourdin and Donovan contracted huge fees at the time, and Morten often claims he received Norway’s most expensive photographic education per se. He also studied Ansel Adams’ books, where he received basic knowledge about composition and darkroom techniques. To begin with, Morten worked with a film-based Sinar camera, but today he works mostly in digital. Many of the advantages and possibilities this provides are deeply rooted in Morten’s photographical philosophy.

In 1987 Morten started to work as a professional photographer full-time, eventually establishing himself successfully onto an international arena. It’s not just hard work, Morten also possesses great talent. He has a keen ‘photographical eye’ and masters the visual aspects fully – something you can witness in this exhibition.