#60 Jenny Palén

Jenny Palén on dreams and making art before understanding it. In her studio outside Stockholm, artist Jenny Palén joins Roland-Philippe Kretzschmar for a conversation about the images that arrive before their meaning becomes clear.

Moving between painting, sculpture, film, textiles and scenography, Palén follows an idea before deciding what form it needs. Sometimes, she only understands what a work was about months or years after making it.

We discuss her beginnings in Stockholm’s graffiti scene, studying art while raising children, and the role of meditation and lucid dreaming in her creative life. She describes how older works return in new forms, why film can feel like the ultimate medium, and what draws her to the meeting of hyperreality and Surrealism.

The conversation also explores humour, the uncertainty of artistic legacy and her connection to Dorothea Tanning’s sculpture and textiles.

The conversation was recorded ahead of Shapeshifting at Belenius, Stockholm. The exhibition brings together Palén, Tanning, Elsa Thoresen and Isabelle Zetterström. Co-curated by Kretzschmar and Belenius, it runs from 6 November to 12 December 2026.

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