The exhibition Séstey / Hverfey presents new work by artist Þorgerður Ólafsdóttir, along with other artifacts she has placed in context with the permanent exhibition at Surtseyjarstofa in Vestmannaeyjar. Þorgerður´s exhibition addresses the notion of how a new place becomes actual in a cultural sense. Works in the exhibition are mappings of a place based …
The exhibition A Window in Reykjavík comprises a selection of works by Ásgrímur Jónsson, whose common factor is that they relate to the artist's surroundings in Reykjavík. The works form part of the collection of the National Gallery of Iceland; Ásgrímur Jónsson bequeathed to the Icelandic nation all his works of art, along with his …
We are pleased to announce the opening of i8 Grandi, a new gallery in Reykjavík that focuses on year-long, single-artist presentations. The inaugural year of i8 Grandi features In Relation to the Sun, an exhibition by Alicja Kwade (b. 1979, Katowice, Poland, lives and works in Berlin, Germany). The artist’s show, which includes installation, sculpture, and work on paper, is now open and will be on view until …
Resistance is an interdisciplinary exhibition that bridges the gap between visual arts and science. The works on display are key works in the collection of the National Gallery of Iceland, that establish an interesting dialogue between art and science and the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. The word Resistance may be read in the context …
Dieter Roth (1930—1998) was a pioneer who respected no boundaries: a thinker, trailblazer, poet, musician, filmmaker and visual artist. A less well-known aspect of his career is that he also made an impression with his creation of innovative jewellery, starting in Iceland in the late 1950s. The first pieces of jewellery designed by Roth were …
The ocean is all around in a new exhibition on level 2 at the House of Collections on Hverfisgata, Reykjavík, where the treasures of Icelandic art are on display. Visitors now have the opportunity to experience works that relate to the seas, and to the discourse on sustainability. The ocean has been an inspiration for …
The work consists of four flags that flutter on flagpoles on the balcony of Akureyri Art Museum. The flags are the product of an experiment where three factors were joined into one: the Icelandic national flag, the font Comic Sans and the letters from the Icelandic alphabet that reprecent the sounds that people make when they …
“There is a man, there is a young man, there is a teenager. In the biggest room of the smallest house hangs a picture of a lion. The lion is holding a smaller lion. That lion carries its tail, thereby forming an endless circulation. Outside the window the wind blows vigorously on a being who …
From September 5-15, 2022, Goethe Morph* invite the public to a holistic program of think tanks and performances, lectures and exhibitions - on site at Nordic House Reykjavík, as well as outdoors and digitally. The exhibition A Growing Body of Evidence will be open in Hvelfing at the Nordic House in Reykjavík 10th Sep – 23rd Dec We …
Unndór Egill Jónsson exhibits his work in a conversation with the work of Ásmundur Sveinsson. Sculptors from different periods meet in dialogue that offers a new insight into Ásmundur’s heritage and introduces new works by a contemporary artist to the viewers. The museum has been working with Ásmund's legacy in this way for some time …
Unndór Egill Jónsson and Ásmundur Sveinsson: After the Blizzard Read More »
The exhibition Sums & Differences brings together works by Gary Hill, Steina, and Woody Vašulka. It aims to present the commonalities of their earliest explorations and the subsequent divergence of their artistic practices, their conceptual, performative, and contemplative interpretations of the physical and the immaterial, along three unique trajectories reflecting their distinct sensibilities and unique …
In his exhibition The System, Elvar Örn Kjartansson seeks to bring to the surface the invisible system behind the modern amenities that we take for granted. Since 2016 Elvar Örn has been working on an extensive photographic project, for which he visits businesses and public bodies in Iceland and takes photographs of various spaces. The …
“I have always felt a need to artistically dissolve my environment or at least to transform it into something less rigid, lighter, more ambiguous. In Icelandic nature I found, in contrast to my country of origin, something pristine, less defined, less determined. As if everything around me was vibrant, in process of transformation and me …
Jóhannes Sveinsson Kjarval (1885-1972) is one of the nation’s most beloved artists and his diverse oeuvre has numerous paintings of Icelandic nature, fantastic creatures and the Icelandic people. Kjarval was born in the south coast of Iceland, at the farm Efri-Ey in the Meðalland district, but was raised by relatives on the east coast at …
Kristinn G. Jóhannsson (born 1936) is an Akureyrian who graduated from Akureyri Junior College 1956. He studied visual art in Akureyri, Reykjavík and Edinburgh College of Art. He finished a Diploma in Education 1962 and worked as a teacher and a principal for close to four decades. Jóhannsson‘s first exhibition was in Akureyri 1954, but …
"Jæja" - the word is like a found object in the Icelandic vocabulary. One can resort to it on almost any occasion. On its own, it means very little, but everyone can make it their own and put it into context so that it acquires meaning. Guðjón Ketilsson creates his art with a similar methodology, …
Abstract geometry was a product of experimental and progressive ideas on the nature and potential of art. The movement came like a meteor into Icelandic cultural life at the beginning of the 1950s and propelled a radical shift in the nation’s art history. The movement was a response to the prevailing aesthetics, seeking to find …
What are the subjects, stories, and challenges that artists in the Arctic region share, in light of the changes happening in this part of the world today? Featuring both emerging and more established artists living today, Down Иorth presents art from an unprecedented cross-section of artists living in Maine, the Canadian Maritimes, Greenland, Iceland, Norway, …
The National Gallery of Iceland presents this major survey of the work of internationally-recognised South African photographer and visual activist Zanele Muholi (b. 1972). Muholi‘s powerful images capture the struggle for the rights of black lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans, queer and intersex people in the artist‘s home country. Muholi gives a voice to those who …
Sigurður Guðjónsson's fascinating world of art leaves no one untouched. One of the leading video artists in contemporary Icelandic art represents the country at the Venice Biennale 2022. The exhibition in Hafnarhús presents the artist's new and older works, which present Sigurður's singular creative practice for audiences. The artist is known for his magnificent videoworks …
Sigurður Guðjónsson presents Transits, an exhibition that unveils the expressive and evocative dimension of the artist’s work. Transits explores the movements, fluxes and discrete drifts occurring in the material world. The selection making up the exhibition comprises both recent work and one new production. As a unified composition, all the works are rooted in the artist’s …
Perpetual Motion extends from Sigurður Guðjónsson’s practice of examining the fluxes of energy found in material things. In experimenting with lenses, light, and motion, he amplifies and observes specific forms and objects, and reveals the energies they hold. Highly magnified images of metal dust are projected onto a giant split screen that results in a …
Kling & Bang, Reykjavík announces the first ever overview exhibition of protest performance actions by Russian feminist political-art collective Pussy Riot. „Velvet Terrorism“ that‘s what Putin‘s spiritual confidant, bishop Tikhon Shevkunov called Pussy Riot‘s performance after Punk Prayer: Virgin Mary, Banish Putin, the collective‘s protest action in Church of Christ the Saviour in Moscow in …
More than 20 new works by Seyðisfjörður-based artist Nína Magnúsdóttir will be presented in an exhibition entitled Lines of Flight, on view in the Skaftfell Gallery from November 27, 2022 to January 29, 2023. The new works were made in the aftermath of the devastating landslides of December 2020, that led to the temporary evacuation of …
