Ann-Ci is an artist from Sweden who picked up painting around 10 years ago. It was a new found passion, which led her to meet with other artists, to learn drawing and painting techniques, and since then has exhibited her own work.
This year, Ann-Ci’s focus was towards a time of personal study and exploration. She had noticed that, for individuals who have attended art schools and colleges, there is a period of exploration, where the artist can discover the boundaries of their process and work, more fully understanding who they are as an artist. For this reason, she joined us here in October.
Previous Works // Ann-Ci Lifmark
Ann-Ci arrived by ferry to Iceland, 14 days before her residency began; taking this time to experience the landscape and to draw inspiration from the nature. What she found, was unlike the Iceland she had expected, in the varied colour palette. This was really a definitive discovery in Ann-Ci’s working process, and she spent many hours walking, and observing, to build up a new and documented colour palette for use in later works.
Nidea is a Portuguese artist from Switzerland, who works as a stage and lighting designer, with a passion for creating in many forms, and personally focussing on writing in recent years. Residency here in Stöðvarfjörður, gave Nidea the time and space to focus on the theme of ‘identity’, as fuel for her first personal monologue, which greatly benefitted from time within the multi-cultural setting of the Fish Factory.
In exploring what we are made of, viewed through the filter of our past, experiences, families & origins, Nidea widened her perspectives of the ‘mechanisms of identity’, and through her writing, aims to express the person that ‘we all are’, regardless of our personal context. Defining what is common between us.
In this research, it became clear that there is no easy or finite way to express identity, and so the monologue became a conversation, in exploring psychological theories and their relation to daily stories and experiences. Overall, concluding that thinking too much about what is that defines us, is not allowing us to live in the moment.
Martina is a performance artist and actress from Croatia, who has spent the last 8 years working nomadically, and is now based in Reykjavik. She joined us here at the Fish Factory for the month of September, 2017.
Last year, whilst working in Slovenia, Martina finished her first performance trilogy, which had been developed and stretched across three locations; The Netherlands, Croatia, and Slovenia. The three pieces within in the trilogy were focussed around consumerism, poverty, and capitalism. Her time in here in Stöðvarfjörður, was the beginning of her second trilogy, as a study of emotion, and radical emotion, which found it’s beginnings in social & online research during her residency.
Melanie is an artist, originally from Munich, Germany, who has lived in the United States for the past 9 years. She joined us here at the Factory in September 2017, continuing work related to an ongoing interest with in-between spaces.
‘the interstice that divides generations; the invisible breath that separates my body from yours. In turn, ideas of inherited, national trauma, and the interdependence of individual and collective healing, are central to my practice. I strive to make work that bridges gaps –joining emotional and physical therapy– to promote our human desire to connect across identities, languages and other imposed boundaries.’
Melanie’s work often takes the form of wearable art pieces, and sometimes sculpture, or books, as with her studied trade in book binding and print making.
Melanie Teresa Bohrer // Previous Works
At the Fish Factory, Melanie was primarily working on a project titled the keeping and telling of secrets. In this piece, she worked on the premises of burden, relief, and displacement of emotional weight, that occurs when sharing intimate thoughts. To this end, fifty-six numbered chiffon bags were filled with one kilogram of black icelandic sand (equal to her body weight), and closed with a continuous, medical suture stitch. This transpired into a video performance where the bags were piled on top of her body, and the stitches gradually opened, returning the sand to the shore. The video ends, with a post-mortem shot of two piles: fifty-six kilos of black sand, and fifty-six empty, stained and torn bags. Both a memorial to the release of secrets.
Melanie Teresa Bohrer // Keeping and Telling of Secrets
Aside from this, Melanie worked on a digital artist book, titled ‘9 4.5 70,560′. The book was inspired by the 70,560 minutes in which she shared a bed with her partner after their break-up, and before her return from Chicago to Munich. The abstracted photographs of bed sheets, act as a physical representation of the space between them.
Given the format of the digital book, the viewer is detached from the imagery, swiping at their desired pace through a previously emotionally charged and quite intimate space.
Anna Choutova is a visual artist and curator who first joined us for residency at the Fish Factory in September 2016 and has just returned for the month of September 2017, in our private studio.
Anna has a fascination with fake, and a lot of her practice is devoted to concepts of consumerism, and the way that every day objects, seemingly mundane, are abstracted, re-packaged, and sold back to us, in rose-tinted vacuum pack. Here at the fish factory, Anna delved into a new realm, of testing how deeply engrained iconic brands are, within our own psyche, and would like to push this further in returning back to London.
Anna Choutova // Fish Factory Works
Aside from a focus on consumerism, Anna took some time whilst here in Stöðvarfjörður, for self-reflection and processing, which can become impossible when in the city, surrounded by constant noise and sensory stimulant. Anna documented this experience through the development of comical, illustrated books, such as a guide to normality; breaking the barrier between the artist and the viewer, through honesty and openness.
Louis is an artist from the UK, who joined us here at the Fish Factory for the month of September, 2017.
With a broad focus on landscape, and the reduction of shape and meaning from varying forms. Interest in orthography, typography, and iconography has provided much inspiration for Louis’ body of work, in presenting distortions and abstractions of known shapes, letters, and scenes, as “vessels for paint to move through”. The outcome then hopes to break down distinctions between physical forms, and written language.
Iceland provided a perfect geographical layout for the extraction of patterns within the nature. Instead of focussing on small details and features, Louis was able to take the vast and open landscapes, and use them for study of their most basic structure, as a template.
Dameon is an artist and sculptor from Austin, Texas, who’s forms are based around minimalism, modernist design, and color field painting. He joined us here at the Fish Factory during August 2017. Of recent, Dameon’s works have been responsive to glacial melt, and the effects of global warming. He began this study, taking inspiration from existing imagery of changing landscapes, but has more recently been visiting significant locations, such as Alaska, for personal observation and documentation.
Here at the Fish Factory, Dameon started with a model from a public art piece that he had been working on before coming to Iceland, and from this, reconstructed and abstracted the work, using his sculpture as a basis for experimentation, using various mediums.
Dameon Lester // Glacier Sculpture
Dameon’s glacial series presents the primary shape in it’s most basic form, reducing the structure to a pattern or template, which is reminiscent of it’s glacial focus, but is not acutely recognisable; this, serving as a reminder of the consistent effect of global warming, and it’s repercussions in the natural environment.
Amy is a performance artist from Cornwall, England, who joined us for the month of August in 2017. Here she worked through various mediums, creating drawings, costumes, instruments, sound and video records, as a means to further develop her performance character, ‘The Worm’.
Amy, as a gardener, has been long inspired by worms, and their position in the process of the sustaining the land, creating fertile soil for the foundation of growth. She has also been interested in the social connotation of the worm, as a small, insignificant, and low creature. Alternatively to this, worms in mythology, such as the Lambton worm are depicted as fearsome dragon-like creatures. The Worm, as a performance character is a combination of these perspectives, as the most insignificant, and the most powerful of beings, all at once.
Amy Lawrence // The Worm At the factory, Amy’s works have all been related to the the microcosm of the character, further developing the universe in which they exist. With pieces, such as a sun hat for the gardener, made from materials and flowers, found here and around the fjord; and self-made wooden instruments, adding authenticity and primitive feel to both the costume and sound recordings. A new experimentation within the project has involved videoing The Worm carrying out every-day activities, such as reading a sewing.
Amy Lawrence // The Worm Leaving the factory, Amy has taken The Worm on a hitch-hiking tour back to Reykjavik, where the character has been out in the Icelandic landscape, before returning to Cornwall!
Emma is a multidisciplinary artist from Malta, who has been living in America, and most recently, in London, England. She joined us here at the Factory for the months of July and August 2017.
In coming to Iceland, Emma followed a growth in her consciousness, that stemmed from an encounter with a humpback whale in America. After moving to London, and being distanced with the waters that surround us, it was time to return to the seas, and to respond to the harsh and wonderful extremes in the natural world.
A dominant focus in Emma’s work, was a practice of writing, a medium which she has recently reclaimed as creative expression. However, during her stay in Stöðvarfjördur, an unexpected and spontaneous focus was in video, and the creation of a looping series of footage of the waves and moving waters here in the fjord.
This triggered an interest and reference to faith and belief; transpiring into an installation piece at the old church here in the town, where the video was played on repeat, and was open to the interpretation and time-frame of the viewer.
Chelsea is a visual and installation artist from Michigan, USA, who joined us for the months of July – August 2017. Her work often consists of abstracted patterns, as a presentation of emotion. The process begins with a feeling, and a colour or shape, and then a freedom in what flows to the canvas.
Here at the Fish Factory, Chelsea spent her first month focussed on a colourful mural for our entrance room, as a depiction of feelings of love.
Chelsea Criger // ‘Love’ Mural
Whilst here in Stöðvarfjördur Chelsea spent a lot of time hiking and cycling around the neighbouring fjords, and was always happy to see sheep walking freely in the landscape. She collected wool that she found during her trips, which she later hopes to spin and knit. She also found herself using sheep horns within her work, that she found here at the Factory, painting visual snap-shots of her experiences and feelings here in Iceland.
Aside from this, Chelsea worked on a series of miniatures, and spent time experimenting with new mediums such as lino print, forming new direction in her practice.
Natalia is a visual artist from Poland, who has been living, studying, and working in London for the past 13 years. She joined us here at the Fish Factory for the month of August, taking some time to re-focus on personal art projects, before beginning an MA in Fine Art at the City and Guild London Art School, this September. The Fish Factory really provided a space for experimentation and discovery for Natalia, enjoying new experiences such as working with ceramics, playing drums, and forming a band named the ‘Vicious Fishes’ with some other artists in residency.
A dominant interest in Natalia’s work is ‘the line’, both physical and metaphorical, which provided inspiration for her main project at the factory, a performance piece involving two people, holding the line and gradually moving away from one another, stretching the material whilst still being connected. This presented ideas around human connections and relationships, the struggles that we often face, and the strength and reliance involved in depending on others. Natalia finds the process of her work to be of the same symbolic importance as the finished piece, and the preparation for the walk required repetition and endurance, in creating 700m of material to work with.
Natalia Markowska // The Line Natalia’s further projects at the factory were focussed on femininity, and comfortability with the natural form, where she created a series of drawings as presentation of the female body, responding to feeling and emotion. She also developed a garden of human conditions, where beans were planted and labelled with relevant feelings and emotions. Out of these plants, the one that grew was labelled ‘Unknown’.
Natalia Markowska // Not what it looks like, but what it feels like
Marta Amigo is a visual artist from Barcelona, who joined us for the month of August 2017. She works using trans-disciplinary techniques and formats, in an exploration of ‘identity’ and it’s relation to space and objects. The process of often begins with visual mapping, and consideration of key words and themes, which then develop through a mixture of drawing, illustration, multi-media, and ceramic work.
Marta Amigo // Previous Works
Here in Stöðvarfjörður, Marta spent time on various bodies of work, taking influence from the space and territory of the fjord, and her travels around Iceland; focussing on the local houses, and the volcanic geography of the country. During her stay, Marta also enjoyed becoming part of a community with the other artists in residency, and together they spent time hiking and playing music, forming a band, named the ‘Vicious Fishes’.
Lea is a conceptual multi-media artist from Minneapolis, who joined us here at the Fish Factory during August 2017. Through her work she investigates contemporary culture, with one key focus being the impacts of the internet and social media, and the online channels which we have accessible to us; giving us the opportunity to form a persona, and choose how we wish to be perceived. Lea’s work attempts to ‘make visible the necessity for understanding our relationship to consumerism’ and to ‘critically examine American’s perception of success, and how that perception generates delusional expectations’.
When Lea arrived here, to a town of less than 200 people, she was surprised to find our factory concert hall, and interested in the way that a small community still connects to society at large, upholding modern value and expectation. She also realised how important it was for her to arrive and be liked, and of importance within this community. These ideas, along with a recurring reference to reality TV in Lea’s work, inspired a video piece set in the concert hall, hosting a beauty pageant where she would play the second runner up, first runner up, and also winner of the competition.
Lea Sorrentino // Miss Stöðvarfjördur 2017
Lea was greatly interested in taking objects or ideas that exist here in the fjord, and giving them new meaning. Her further projects at the factory focussed on a second video project, creating a playful, fictional narrative and ‘dark side’ to the local attraction of Petra’s Stone Collection, and in collaboration with artist, Dameon Lester, she collected various bones from the shore, in order to create a ‘new’ animal of Stöðvarfjördur.
Riley is an American & Australian artist, living in Austin, Texas, who joined us here at the Fish Factory for the month of July. Coming from a multi-national background has formed an integral part of her life and influence, and experiences of culture in many countries, across continents, has fed into her work and travel as an artist and photographer. These creative outlets are important in providing her with a tool for both expression, and also in documenting and working through problems or situations.
Here at the Fish Factory, Riley focused on a ongoing body of work, capturing ethereal and minimal landscapes, finding much inspiration from the changing weather and surroundings in the fjord. This series is also driven by personal instinct, forming a soothing working process, and an organic outcome.
Riley Ryan-Wood // Landscapes
Aside from this lens-based body of work, Riley has created a video collaboration with artist in residency, Emma Johnson, and has also spent time developing an ongoing series of short stories, inspired by geometric shapes. A reading from story, Circles, can be viewed below in the interview video about her stay.
Susan Wood is a returning artist from Scotland, who previously joined us in March 2017. She began painting in 2002, and completed an MA in Glass at the University of Sunderland, with work revolving around the sea and shore. These themes have shown strong influence in her work here at the fish factory, along with an interest in the ‘Cabinet of Curiosities’ which dates back to the Renaissance but has been interpreted differently over time. Two particular interpretations which have inspired Susan, have been Joseph Cornell’s boxes of curious objects, and Kurt Schwitters, who also compiled objects of interest.
The 5 Chinese elements offered similar inspiration for Susan’s work here in July, and she responded to the categories of wood, fire, earth, metal & water.
Susan Wood // Cabinet of Curiosities
Back in March, Susan worked with seaweed and the kelp that had washed up along the shore. She hoped to continue this work in July, to create a weaving. When she arrived, she found that the Kelp had changed dramatically over the months, now providing a harsher and rougher material, offering new perspective to her weaving; showing the opportunity in the ageing process.
Catherine Stringer is an artist from Tasmania, who stayed with us for one month in July 2017. She has taken part in a number of solo, and group exhibitions, and her work is very much shaped by her interest in in water and the ocean, with her best known pieces showing dreamy underwater images. Focus around the realms above and below water in Catherine’s work can be taken to represent the ‘conscious and the unconscious, the physical and the spiritual, the rational and the intuitive, or any other duality’.
Underwater Images
Underwater Images
Underwater Images
Catherine Stringer // Underwater Images
In 2011, Catherine worked on creative residency at the King Island Cultural Centre, Australia. During this time she started experimenting with natural plant materials and seaweeds, and developed a paper making technique for use in artworks. Interest stemmed from the 1835 wreck of the Irish convict ship, Neva, for which Catherine produced garments, such as dresses and capes, in ‘Neva Reliquary’ & ‘Neva Vestiges’, as a personal response to the tragedy, and to the women and children who lost their lives.
Neva Reliquary
Neva Reliquary
Neva Reliquary
Catherine Stringer // Neva Reliquary
Here at the Fish Factory, Catherine has experimented with new species of seaweed and Icelandic mosses, to her paper making process, and has drawn inspiration from the landscape, the town, and the local folklore; working on a collection of fish, and seals. Catherine was drawn to the story of the ‘Selkie’, a norse story of a seal woman, trapped in her human body, but who eventually returns to the sea. In response to this tale, Catherine worked on seals looking in towards the land, and women looking out towards the sea, along with traditional Icelandic dress that the woman may have worn in her human form.
Laura Marconi is an artist from Italy, living in Philadelphia in the USA, who stayed with us for the month of July 2017. Laura studied at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts where she received a classical training, and majored in painting. This strong foundation for Laura’s work has carried through her career as an artist, and she still enjoys to work on basic principles such as life drawing, which she sees as the basis for her creative expression.
Laura Marconi // Life Drawing
Laura Marconi // Life Drawing
Laura Marconi // Life Drawing
Laura has been coming to Iceland for art residencies since 2013, and has built a connection with the landscape which offers a dominant inspiration within the work she creates here. Over these visits, the mountains have shown a strong focus in her work, and whilst sometimes working with techniques of realism, Laura also likes to work beyond what she sees in front of her, and express reflection and transformation of landscape. She uses her creative expression to consider the bigger questions in life, as an exploration of self.
Laura Marconi // Mountain Series
While here at the Fish Factory, Laura has furthered this study into reflection in the landscape, but has transformed the process in two ways; first by closing her work inside a circle, representative of her position as an immigrant, who will always be the ‘onlooker‘ of the scene, without fully being inside it, and also to represent the continuation of the cycle of life. Laura then rotated her work, and added colour, in order to show that things are not always as they first appear. These acrylic paintings are open to the interpretation of the viewer.
Jan is an artist from Korea, currently living in the Netherlands, who joined us for the months of June and July 2017. This has been his second time to the factory, as in March 2016, he travelled the ring road with friends and happened to find himself here in Stöðvarfjörður. After touring the factory with Una, he decided to come back again in the future for creative residency, to be inspired by the nature, and to further work on a continued interest in ambivalence. This is a prevalent theme in Jan´s work, focussing on uncertainty in contradictory moments and feelings.
Jan Yongdeok Lim // Ambivalence
After some time immersing himself in the landscape, appreciating simplicity and solitude, without the noise of city life and distractions; Jan spent countless hours painting, replicating one significant pattern that has appeared across his works, old and new. Residency at the Fish Factory also offered the space and time for the creation of two large canvas painting, presenting ambivalence in the surroundings and landscape.
Jane Affleck is a PhD candidate, instructor, writer, editor, and artist from Canada who was at the Fish Factory Creative Centre for the June 2017 residency.
Although Jane completed a bachelor of fine arts in 1995, this was her first artist residency. For a couple of years after completing the BFA, she shared a studio with two other painters and produced a series of large-scale, realistic paintings with an environmental theme (using “found” insects, mainly bees, as models, she would paint them flying through invented landscapes or cloudscapes).
However, she shifted her focus to studying literature and writing, and in 2007 completed a master of arts in English and creative writing. Around this time, she began to work on a series of simple, almost “cartoony” drawings based on memories of strangers seen on the metro (Montreal’s subway system), writing short prose pieces to accompany them.
Since moving to Ontario in 2014, she has been working on a similar series of drawings of people seen on the subway or streets of Toronto (with no accompanying prose). In April 2017, four of drawings from this ongoing series were exhibited in a group show.
Since 2012, Jane has been teaching courses about comics history and contemporary graphic novels at NSCAD University in Nova Scotia, Canada. One is a survey-type course that considers historical and contemporary work in France, North America, and Japan. The other focuses on approximately 1,000 years of Japanese visual culture, with a few weeks examining the diversity of contemporary “manga” (Japanese comics).
Researching and teaching these topics have influenced Jane’s approach to creating art (practice what you preach!). In January 2017, she began a “graphic memoir” (a comics-style autobiographical work – Alison Bechdel’s Fun Home is an example of this genre); while at the Fish Factory, Jane continued working on this project. The memoir is based on her experiences as a single woman owning a house in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia. The working title for the project is The House that Jane Bought: A Cautionary Tale for Single, Ambitious Women. Themes in the work include feminism, capitalism/consumerism, privilege, race, and colonization. When she bought the house, she saw it as confirmation of her independence and self-sufficiency as career-focused woman who had finally achieved some kind of capital-S success. However, she soon realized that instead of being subject to landlords (and roommates), she was now at the mercy of the city and developers, and even neighbours: from an exponential property tax increase, to proposals for development projects out of scale with the neighbourhood, to neighbours partying all weekend. Two years later, she started her PhD in another province, so rented the house to tenants. It was at this point that issues around privilege and race entered the picture, which also (in part) led her to think about colonization, and about Canada as a colonial nation-state that perpetuates a settler-focused narrative about its founding. This project thus presents a kind of counter-narrative critique, from the perspective of a white female settler of some privilege, of the current socio-political situation in Nova Scotia in particular, and in Canada more broadly.
While at the Fish Factory Creative Centre, Jane completed an additional 21 pages of this work – fewer than her goal of 30, but nonetheless motivating her to continue working on this project (she has completed a total of 38 pages and hopes to finish another dozen or so by the end of August 2017). She found the Fish Factory and the town of Stöðvarfjörður ideal settings in which to focus on her project: the shared studio facilities meant opportunities to discuss work in progress with other artists, while the beautiful mountains of the surrounding fjord allowed her to experience nature in meditative solitude (and to get a different perspective on the project and life in general!). Takk fyrir!
Amanda Lim is a visual artist from Singapore who stayed with us for the month of June 2017. Her creative interests are in the exploration of political, social and cultural issues, which form personal interpretation, through lived experiences and influences. Her experimental works are often creative documentations that lead to interaction and conversations around issues.
Here at the Fish Factory this deloped through the continuation of work that was started in Singapore, as a response to consumer culture, and an experiment of social interaction with purchasing ´something´, whilst also purchasing ´nothing´. The creative focus being bags of air from Singapore, to see how consumers would respond.
Amanda Lim // Live a Full Life
Amanda sold her ‘Live a Full Life’ air bags in locations around Stöðvarfjörður, and will return to singapore with air from Iceland, to compare public engagement in both locations.
Patricia Casey is a visual artist from Australia who stayed with us for one month in June 2017. She has been a praticing artist since 1999, and has taken part in a number of group and solo exhibitions, at home and internationally, throughout her career. Patricia’s work considers an ongoing exploration of the themes of memory, dreams and imagination.
Patricia Casey // Rock Photography
Here at the factory, Patricia has been inspired by the lines in the Icelandic landscape, and the ever-present and definitive line that appears in matter which has been formed together, and has split apart (seen within Patricia´s photographic research of rocks in the landscape). From this, a water colour study was inspired, and combined with mixed media in the form of embroidery, in recreating and highlighting the importance of these natural and domanant lines.
Patricia Casey // Water Colour & Embroidery
As her main artistic medium, photography has formed a basis for Patricias residency here in Stöðvarfjörður, beautifully capturing the mist and the diversity of the nature. Drawing upon Merleau Ponty´s ´Lived Body´, and the personal relationship with the world, the Fish Factory has given Patricia the opportunity to slow down, and approach her study through thoughtful and encouraged connection with the landscape.
Lauren Meranda is a visual artist from the USA, who´s who´s design practice focusses dominantly on cultural institutions, social activism, civic engagement, and public memory; using experimental methods of media, interative experience, and storytelling. Her work here at the Fish Factory Creative Centre during June 2017, has been closely connected to her professional stance in allowing the individual to co-create in the storytelling process, and to involve elements of social engagement through artistic methods. During the month, Lauren has been both
Her work here at the Fish Factory Creative Centre during June 2017, has been closely connected to her professional stance in allowing the individual to co-create in the storytelling process, and to involve elements of social engagement through artistic methods. During the month, Lauren has been both practicing and learning the process of virtual reality coding, and has foccussed on creation of the ´surreal´, which she experienced in the contrasting position of old or abandoned man-made equipment, within the raw Icelandic landscape.
Lauren Meranda // Virtual Reality Stills
Lauren´s practice of virtual reality is formatted for viewing using a headset, which enables the viewer to be completely immersed in the created environment of the ´surreal´, and to join the process of engagement through interactive involvement.
Aggie Toppins is a Graphic Designer and educator from the USA, who stayed with us for the month of June 2017. Aggie is the principal of The Offical Studio, a practice which works with small businesses and nonprofit organizations on the development of branding though digital & print mediums. Aside from this, she is also the founder of the Unoffical Press, as a an outlet of independent studio work, including projects that utilise forms of graphic design in connecting and engaging with culture.
Aggie Toppins // Palimpsests
Aggie has been working on a continual collage series of ´Palimpsests´, that gather the index of global locations, and offer a window into the steps that are traced through personal narrative, and records of travels. These are open-ended works that offer personal significance, whilst leaving room for multiple interpretations and meanings.
Aggie Toppins // Cyanotype Prints
While here, Aggie has also been experimenting with a new medium, of cyanotype prints; this involving a light sensitive process, inspired by the 24 hour sunlight here in Stöðvarfjördur. The outcome highlights key themes of transition and the tracing of movement, though that which is ´present on the page, and absent. A thing that was there, and a thing that is there.´ Aggie has enjoyed this explorative practice and hopes to integrate the process into future work.
Mara Colecchia is an Italian artist from the USA who stayed with us one month in May 2017. She born in Italy in 1976 where she graduated in Rome at the European Institute of Design in 1999. She worked locally in the animation industry as an animator and successively as a writed till 2009 when she moved to Los Angeles, CA, to attend a 1 year screenwriting class at”The New York Film Academy” (NYFA). She made 23 collective exhibitions between 2013 and 2016.
Artwork by Mara Colecchia, May 2017
Maracole’s work is deeply informed by surrealistic caprice and central Italian simplicity. Whether working at small or large scale sculptures, wearable art or street-art installations, her pieces are a chorus of whimsy, wit and devilish transgression. Maracole’s clever yet ingenious charade reflects the universal fantasy and she pulls it off with a combination of innocence and ambiguity. Her sculptures and wearable art represent a different temperament, one that draws heavily from her extensive background in animation and children’s literature. Here we see compelling narrative threads that treat design as a teller of Boccaccio-like tales.
Artwork by Mara Colecchia, May 2017
Specifically, Maracole represents wigs, hats and other objects of embellishment and camouflage as if they were authentic antiquities. This too is rooted in her Italian provenance where an intimate connection to archaeological remains is a national characteristic. But with that love of the distant past comes the melancholy of dislocation. Every piece of art designed by Maracole is an emblematic representation of a personal struggle to adapt to a fast-changing world, despite of a profound sense of loss.
During her stay in Iceland, Mara interested in an Icelandic texture culture and pictures on Icelandic Kronas. That’s why she collaborated with Rosa about it and she found a special book and fabrics and it opened a new field to her project. She started to do plan and drawings and then it continued with hand stitches in progress. Eventually, Mara created three hats during her stay and she combined them with her special creation jewellery nose. You can find more detail about her project and artwork in the interview below!
