...

All that has been said here does not exclude the fact that Henrik Sørensen, like all other artists, has sought a significant part of his inspiration from art itself. You see it in the very first original works, the two old ones, and the blue-clad girl with the gold paper crown on, where the spiritual relationship with Werenskiold and Wold-Torne is so noticeable. Since then, the experience of Persian and French faience and other elements have played a decisive role. But what is closest to his heart of all painting, I think, is the rose-painting (rosemaling). He mentions names like Luraasen and Sata in the same reverent tone as when he says Rembrandt. And what is rose-painting other than a play with freely invented forms and rhythms, an escape from reality, an abstraction, la deshumanisación del arte? And how do you want a poor catalog preface to successfully get out of this? I got a celebrity to begin for me, now I ask one to stop; I'm asking Goethe. He says it in German, but it is a different kind of German than what we should be accustomed to: "Freutet euch des wahren Scheins, Euch des ernsten Spieles, Kein Lebendiges ist Eins, Immer ist's ein Vieles."

Alf Rolfsen.