Die Virtuosität der Handgriffe
On WERK at Gallery Gudmundsdottir, WERK - Labor Move at Reykjavik Art Museum and the Keep Frozen art works.
By Julia Gwendolyn Schneider
Installation pictures from Swimming Pool - Troubled Waters exhibition
Swimming Pool - Troubled Waters catalogue can be ordered!
162 p., numerous colored illustrations, german/english, 23 x 30 cm
AUTHOR*S
Andrew Berardini, Övül Ö. Durmusoglu, Gustav Elgin, Maaike Gouwenberg, Gudny Gudmundsdóttir, Nele Heinevetter (TROPEZ), John Holten, Linda Jalloh, Àngels Miralda, Mearg Negusse, Bert Rebhandl, Vanina Saracino, Valeria Schulte-Fischedick, Olaf Stüber, Carola Uehlken
Order here.
Keep Frozen showing at Scharaun Berlin
‘Kino Simensstadt - Der Komplex Arbeit’ film program curated by Jaro Straub and Olaf Stüber.
Mobilizing the Arctic. Polar Bears and Puffins in Transnational Interplay
Katla Kjartansdóttir and Kristinn Schram contextualize the puffin works in a book titled ‘ Mobility and Transnational Iceland: Current Transformations and Global Entanglements’ available here for pdf downlaod.
''The puffin has also played a key role in several works by contemporary Icelandic visual artists Hulda Rós Guðnadóttir. In her work 'Don´t Feed them after Midnight (2006), a mixed media installation, performance and design, Guðnadóttir deals critically with the image of the Icelandic artists as a weird, elf-like figure akin to the vulnerable puffin. As stated in the short introductory text on her website, this work is ''a game of reappropriation (sic), of taking control over the creation of meaning of the symbols representing one´s own identity'' (Guðnadóttir 2006). The puffin is also a central figure in her work 'Material Puffin' (2014) in which he plays with human/animal relations, national imagery, and gender roles. In this work, the artist appears wearing a festive pink gown and a large puffin mask in the harbour area in Reykjavík. As can be seen on one of the stills from the work, shown below, she holds a gas pump in her hand and seems to be spraying gold and glitter into the ocean. In her multi-layered visual narration, the artist gives the masculine harbour area a feminine touch an evokes challenging questions in relation to tourism and urban development, sustainability, ecological awareness, and future visions. In yet another recent work, entitled 'All is Full of Love' (2019), Guðnadóttir again engages with the puffin as a mass-produced tourist souvenir and material emblem of contemporary Icelandic cultural identity. In this work, the artist critically explores questions relating to the commodification of ethnic identity (Comoroff and Comoroff 2009) that are linked to the massive growth of tourism in Iceland and the role of the artist (as a puffin) within ongoing social and cultural developments. Again, dressed in pink, she playfuly positions, and literally masks herself as a puffin, with a large puffin mask on her head, inviting the viewer to participate in discussions of current socio-economic issues in the country, complex human/animal relations, and their local/global interplay. In Guðnadóttir´s works, the puffin evokes questions of how overexploitation can lead to the exhaustion or even complete extinction of natural resources. Along with the snowy owl and the European turtledove, the Atlantic puffin has recently been placed on the BirdLife International list of birds in danger of extinction (BirdLife International 2018). Although the puffin is indeed cute and cuddly, it can also be described as a non-human reminder of the fragile ecosystem of the Arctic, ecological anxieties, and the gloomy ecological prospects for our post-human/post/anthropocentric times, which include climate change, habitat-loss and/or bird extinction.''
Working in the studio with dancer Karolina Ginman and choreographer Margrét Sara Guðjónsdóttir adapting Margrét´s hyperstates to the SILICA project. Photo by María Erla Marelsdóttir, ambassador of Iceland to Germany during her studio visit in June 2021.
Work in process S-I-L-I-C-A behind the scenes.
WERK - Labor Move at Reykjavik Art Museum
≥≥≥ 05.02 - 09.05 2021 Reykjavik Art Museum, Hafnarhús
’WERK - Labor Move’, solo exhibition curated by Birta Gudjonsdottir.
The installation WERK - Labor Move is made especially for the museum’s main hall as the building Hafnarhús was originally built as a warehouse on the quay. The exhibition is based on an examination of the functioning of the multi-layered global economy, and the perspective of the familiar, the local, is used to analyse and project a connection with the global. Parallels in the manual labor which went on in this building before are examined in the context of the gentrification process of the port area and similar development around the world. Hafnarhúsið is the first building by Reykjavík Harbour to be given a new role as a building for art and cultural activities and has become characteristic of the area, similar to the development of harbour areas everywhere.
The work consists of a three-channel filmic work, Labor Move; sculptures, directly related to the filmic work; and a video recording titled Labor Love which shows the assembling of the sculptures in the building in the run-up to the exhibition opening.
The exhibition consists of more than 5000 identical boxes that usually contain frozen fish. They create an immersive installation in a space of ca. 350 m2. The 3-channel video Labor Move is the centre point of the installation. We see several dockworkers performing specifically for the camera, based on movements they have become accustomed to over a long period of time while unloading boxes of frozen fish from within the hull of the first trawler and over to the quayside at Reykjavík Harbour. The same movements are repeated, they throw heavy boxes from one place to another with considerable coordination and skill. Labor Move is an art work in itself, but also a documentation in film and sound about the 48-hour performance of the dockers in front of viewers in the exhibition space in Leipzig in 2016. The 48-hour duration of the performance is the same time as the dockworkers usually have to unload the fish from a freezer trawler.
Artist Hulda Ros Gudnadottir with curator Birta Gudjonsdottir inside the installation WERK - Labor Move
Artist - Curator conversation / WERK - Labor Move
Ca. forty minutes video conversation between Hulda Rós Gudnadottir and curator Birta Gudjonsdottir about the solo exhibition WERK - Labor Move at Reykjavik Art Museum 5th of February to 9th of May 2021. With English subtitles. Courtesy of Reykjavik Art Museum.
Flash Art, review by Andreas Schlaegel
Read here.
Artists in Conversation
Online event / Embassy of Iceland in Berlin, Künstlerhaus Bethanien and Icelandic Art Center.
‘Three artist from Iceland in Conversation’ - moderated by Cassandra Edlefsen Lasch live online on the 23.03.2021. Hulda Rós Guðnadóttir, Anna Rún Tryggvadóttir, Styrmir Örn Guðmundsson
Video documentation here.
Swimming Pool - Troubled Waters catalogue can be ordered!
The catalogue is published on the occasion of the exhibition “Swimming Pool – Troubled Waters” that opens on the 6th of August 2021 at the Künstlerhaus Bethanien, Berlin.
162 p., numerous colored illustrations, german/english, 23 x 30 cm
AUTHOR*S
Andrew Berardini, Övül Ö. Durmusoglu, Gustav Elgin, Maaike Gouwenberg, Gudny Gudmundsdóttir, Nele Heinevetter (TROPEZ), John Holten, Linda Jalloh, Àngels Miralda, Mearg Negusse, Bert Rebhandl, Vanina Saracino, Valeria Schulte-Fischedick, Olaf Stüber, Carola Uehlken
Order here.
Art Review in Art-Agenda
Review by Kimberly Bradley published on Art Agenda about the exhibition WERK - Labor Move, solo exhibition, at Reykjavik Art Museum. Here.
Interview on Monocle radio →
Report on the Icelandic Art Scene. Introduction of WERK - Labor Move solo exhibition at Reykjavik Art Museum. Interview…. by Kimberly Bradley.
Solo exhibition at Reykjavík Art Museum
A mixed-media installation ‘WERK - Labor Move’ has opened at the Reykjavik Art Museum, Hafnarhús and will be open until 9th of May 2021. Curated by Birta Gudjónsdóttir
New series of 19 pairs of photographs previewed on Reykjavik Association of Sculptors instagram page
as part of the ‘Across the Golden Bridge’ summer exhibition in public space.
‘Hulda Rós embarked on an exploration process to create and follow her own system or rules of a game, a procedure of walking along the neighbourhood's cycling and walking paths and positioning herself in specific locations at 10-minute intervals and taking photographs at that location to the right and left. thus mapping out her experience of the neighbourhood.
Hulda Rós Guðnadóttir's work in the exhibition ACROSS THE GOLDEN BRIDGE takes place online, on the Reykjavik Association of Sculptor's Instagram account, during the exhibition period; 30th May – 20th September 2020.
The photos will be updated regularly on Instagram, which takes its name from the moment; an instant, a vehicle for addressing a moment in time, caught by the camera.’ - Birta Gudjónsdóttir curator
German press from exhibition in Ansbach
'Roh' at The Loft, Ansbach, Germany
Roh (Raw) - Two artist exhibition @ The Loft, Maximilianstrasse 29, 91522 Ansbach, Germany. Curator Dr. Christian Schoen. The exhibition will be open every Saturday 3-5pm until 21st of December 2019 and by appointment weekdays 9-4pm. Exhibiting with artist Bryndís Björnsdóttir.
Installation view
Installation view
Installation view
Installation view
Installation view
Installation view
Installation view
Ocean Glory at Flutgraben Performances 16th of November 2019
The screening was part of a live performance by Ocean Glory collaborator choregrapher-in-residence Margrét Sara Gudjónsdóttir.
Kunstfabrik am Flutgraben.
The Long Term You Cannot Afford at Savvy Contemporary, Berlin
THE LONG TERM YOU CANNOT AFFORD. ON THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE TOXIC AT Silent Green Kulturquartier (Kuppelhalle) Gerichtstraße 35 13347 Berlin THE LONG TERM YOU CAN NOT AFFORD. ON THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE TOXIC addresses environmental injustices through the lens of the toxic and the discrimination surrounding its production and circulation, all deeply rooted in historical structures.
Still from ‘Ocean Glory’
On the 9th of November 2019 new video work ‘Ocean Glory’ a result of a new collaboration with composer Guðný Guðmndsdóttir and choregrapher Margrét Sara Guðjónsdóttir and also outcome of a new research project S-I-L-I-C-A, was premiered as a part of Invocations public program at Savvy Contemporary in Berlin. Exhibition: The Long Term You Cannot Afford On the Distribution of the Toxic, curated by Antonia Alampi and Caroline Ektander. The video performance starts at 3:07 in the video above and is shown in its entirety.
©HannesWiedemann. From the introductions.
Performance view. ©HannesWiedemann
©HannesWiedemann. Performance view.
Opening of 'Ocean Dwellers' curated by Solvej Helweg Ovesen
From the opening of Ocean Dwellers, a group exhibition @ Fælleshus, Nordic Embassies, Rauchstraess 1, Berlin-Tiergarten in mid October 2019. Open until 30.01.2020.
Picture taken by the vitrine that was part of Hulda Rós Guðnadóttir´s work. From left to right: Unknown woman, the artist Hulda Rós Guðnadóttir, artist Rúrí also exhibiting in Ocean Dwellers, Icelandic ambassador in Berlin María Erla Marelsdóttir, Pétur Arason collector.
The opening was packed with guests.
Christine Koberling chatting with the artist.
From the artist talk at the opening. Artist Hulda Rós Guðnadóttir in foreground.
Installation view of the art work ‘S-I-L-I-C-A 01’
A vitrine display was also part of the art work.