Svanhildur Halla Haraldsdóttir
www.svanhildurhalla.com
 

In Reykjavík there is a street
on the street there is a house
in the house there is a corridor
in the corridor there is a room
in the room there is a bed
on the bed there is a blanket
under the blanket there is a girl
the girl turned the blanket over
the blanket turned the bed over
the bed turned the room over
the room turned the corridor over
the corridor turned the house over
the house turned the street over
and the street turned Reykjavík over

I invite people to take a seat in Kjarvalsstaðir’s exhibition space and listen to a story. A story that is not mine, but ours, moulded together. A narrative that leads the listener around the space where the passing moment meets a memory of something that has been or perhaps never was. Memories float downstream and intertwine with new experiences, thus creating the sense of a path yet to come. The work, woven together, creates a whole that holds both memories of the past and of passing moments. Fragmentary narrations give a sense of pulsating and colliding dimensions where the subjective experience flows between reality and imagination, dream and wakening, consciousness and subconsciousness.

Spaces affect the way we behave, but simultaneously we also affect the space. The longer we dwell in a space the more familiar it becomes. Our bodies adjust to it and vice versa. Microscopic particles cling to a cloth that we can only sense as a scent and foam moulds itself around the shape of our bodies. The body shapes the material and the material shapes the body. The mind shapes the story and the story shapes the mind. One can turn such statements upside down, stir them up again and repeat the game.

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