Corpus explores themes of the body and the human and our ways of relating to our environments. Through their distinct practices, the artists question with intrigue the ways in which we relate to our own body, within space, in relation to other beings, and the body’s place in a hierarchical evolutionary structure.
Corpus is an exhibition with work by Arvida Byström (SE), Sunneva Ása Weisshappel (IS), Hertta Kiiski (FI), Salad Hilowle (SE), Jeanette Ehlers (DK), Klāvs Liepiņš & Renāte Feizaka (LV/IS). Working within materiality, fabrics, sculpture, and photography.
Through this larger context of the “body” as concept, more specific interactions are examined – namely, gendered existence and femininity, blackness and the body, and the body’s relation to nature and the non-human. In Corpus, the artists allow for a compelling exploration of representation of the body through a focus on materiality, using this materiality to propose new relations of the body to space, place, racial and gendered relations, and our natural and non-human environments.
Arvida Byström is a multidisciplinary artist whose work is rooted in ideas that deal with the internet and its social, aesthetic and commercial implications. She is known for employing a hyper- feminine aesthetic to explore themes concerning the complexities of femininity, identity, body image, social dynamics, emerging technologies and economic principles through primarily photography, performance and sculpture work.
Jeannette Ehlers, an Afro-Caribbean-Danish artist based in Copenhagen, draws upon sensorial and bodily experiences of black existence in her multidisciplinary practice. She presents histories of Black experience to examine ways in which representations and stereotypes of the Black body affect personal and historical identities.
Salad Hilowle is a Somali-Swedish filmmaker and visual artist based in Stockholm whose research-based approach highlights the representation of Afro-Swedes in cultural history, reclaiming overlooked and forgotten stories. His works examine the power of the Black body, as well as the power of stereotypes to linger in collective consciousness. As an image-driven storyteller, Hilowle carefully navigates historical narratives that linger in our collective consciousness and brings forth new perspectives without losing the complexities and nuances that permeate the subjects.
In Hertta Kiiski’s practice, she considers how we can prioritize non-human forms of living as a way to question the hierarchy of the human. Working with fabrics, sewing, photography, video work, and sculpture, she uses this array of mediums to reconfigure conceptions of the Anthropocene.
Klāvs Liepiņš & Renāte Feizaka examine issues of climate change and human’s relation to our environments. Their work unpacks elements of belonging and the body and identity in relation to nature and the non-human.
In Sunneva Ása Weisshappel’s painterly sculptures, she uses fabric, hair, and pigments to create canvases that reference the body, flesh, and feminine forms.
