Coupling defeat and despair with rebellious humor, Danish artist Peter Linde Busk explores the grotesque conditions of human existence. Populating his works with tragic and awkward figures like fallen heroes, jesters, or outlaws in abstract spaces of detailed ornamentation, his figurations are meticulously composed using a great variety of textures and techniques, and often incorporate random material relics from previous works. Similarly, his titles are wry quotes or poetic fragments: it is from Rilke that Peter Linde Busk has borrowed the title of the book, Who speaks of victory? To endure is all.

This richly illustrated monograph features a major essay by art historian Maria Fabricius Hansen juxtaposing Linde Busk’s work with medieval mosaics and the grotesques of Renaissance art. A catalogue raisonné of works from 2015 to 2022 is supplemented by short prose texts and a playlist by writer Minna Grooss that suggests a sound track to the materially emphatic works by Linde Busk.