Curated by Sasha Rose Richter and Pamela Grombacher.
The Icelandic artist Rósa Sigrún Jónsdóttir transformed rum46 into a botanical oasis with an installation of crochet plants and flowers that “grew” though the gallery space, against a backdrop of floral watercolour paintings.
This is one edition of Jónsdóttir’s ongoing exhibition series, Grös/Grasses, in which she meticulously reproduces medicinal Icelandic plants in thread - a practice that combines her fascination with natural medicine and her commitment to the feminist legacy and activist potential of craft.
This is one edition of Jónsdóttir’s ongoing exhibition series, Grös/Grasses, in which she meticulously reproduces medicinal Icelandic plants in thread - a practice that combines her fascination with natural medicine and her commitment to the feminist legacy and activist potential of craft.
Artist statement:
Since my graduation from The Iceland Academy of the Arts in 2001, I have regularly created large-scale textile installations and sculptures. For the last few years I have been working with groups of craftswomen in the hope of drawing wider attention to the importance and possibilities of craft as an innovative form of creative work.
Although crochet is sometimes belittled as the domain of elderly ladies, it is a politically engaged, radical artform as well as a positive social force. “Craftivism” is now an accepted term in the artworld, but the activist use of craft has long historical roots, for example by the Tricoteuses of the French Revolution, who knitted as a means of resisting the ban against women’s political assembly.
In my mind, using a slow technique like knitting and crochet is also a way to celebrate my mother’s tradition by exploring the endless possibilities of thread, while at the same time resisting consumerism and spreading my belief in the meditative and healing powers of craft.
Since my graduation from The Iceland Academy of the Arts in 2001, I have regularly created large-scale textile installations and sculptures. For the last few years I have been working with groups of craftswomen in the hope of drawing wider attention to the importance and possibilities of craft as an innovative form of creative work.
Although crochet is sometimes belittled as the domain of elderly ladies, it is a politically engaged, radical artform as well as a positive social force. “Craftivism” is now an accepted term in the artworld, but the activist use of craft has long historical roots, for example by the Tricoteuses of the French Revolution, who knitted as a means of resisting the ban against women’s political assembly.
In my mind, using a slow technique like knitting and crochet is also a way to celebrate my mother’s tradition by exploring the endless possibilities of thread, while at the same time resisting consumerism and spreading my belief in the meditative and healing powers of craft.
Exhibition: September/October, 2019
Events: Crochet Workshop and Artist Talk
Exhibition place: rum46, Aarhus
Supported by Statens Kunstfond, rum46 and Aarhus Kommune.
Photo credit Jacob Juhl