Event Venue
Boråsvägen 25, SE-121 48 Johanneshov, Sverige
Exhibition
Anna Taina-Nielsen
The Non-Seen Stage
28 February – 1 March 2020
Vernissage: 28 February, 17.00–22.00
Artist talk: Saturday 29 February, 15.00
Opening hours: Saturday – Sunday, 12.00–18.00
The artist talk will be held in English.
Address:
Boråsvägen 25, SE-121 48 Johanneshov, Sverige
Tunnelbana: Hammarbyhöjden
Curated by Juanma González
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Introduction
My main interest in being a part of the artist- and curator-run collective Flat Octopus is the opportunity to bring art into private homes. I see it as a way of confronting the traditional ways of looking at art; breaking down what conventional art exhibiting is all about – but it does not come without challenges. The three main challenges that I perceive are the following:
First, the challenge is for the artist to show their artworks in an intimate place, influenced by objects of everyday life within the enclosed sealed-up box that makes a home. The second challenge is from the point of view of the owner of the flat. They must open their home to strangers, like a gallery space, but in this case the visitors do not see only anonymous white walls, but also a glimpse of the personality of the person living in the flat. And, finally, the third challenge is that art as a cultural manifestation is now suddenly challenged to redefine itself by expanding conventional boundaries in the art field to those of a personal space. How does this affect the artwork and the understanding of art in the exhibition context?
By questioning the ‘normal way’ of how to show and perceive art, we also question how to break away from the habits of everyday (cultural) life. I invited Anna Taina-Nielsen with this topic in mind to interact with the concepts of Flat Octopus. InThe Non-Seen Stage, Taina-Nielsen will produce a site-specific painting in the exhibition flat, turning the home into a space of both art production and a showroom.
In her art practice she questions the rhythms and gestural acts of painting, approaching painting as a process that has a beginning and an end and is made of a strict set of rules and rhythms, inspired by the repetitive routines of everyday life. By performing systematic painting on site, she questions the temporality and the fluctuating notion of art production as well as art perception.
Anna Taina-Nielsen will exhibit her installation work in the apartment of Aritz. Aritz is a person who is not linked to the art world but he is a fan of Flat Octopus’ initiatives and philosophy, and he offered to open up his home for us. We – the artist, our collective and the spectators – are allowed to witness Aritz’ private space, and see where he spends his everyday life, camouflaged in a setting created by the artist.
We invite you to an art show where the conventional way of exhibiting art is turned upside down and in a new manner infiltrates the routines of how art should be perceived. Art has the power to convert and challenge the ordinary, and to create beauty from simple ideas and actions. By inviting Anna Taina-Nielsen to work in the apartment and display it for everyone to see, I wonder if everyday life can become more artistic, breaking down the boundaries of the separation of art and life, art and spectator.
Juanma González, curator
Artist’s text
In an art production there are many layers put into the work process which the viewers normally do not see, however, the first thing they usually do see is the last thing that the artist sees.
The exhibition The Non-Seen Stage consists of a site-specific painting and a video projection of the painting process made inside a private home on Boråsvägen 25 in Stockholm. By showing the painting process alongside the actual painting, the artists’ approach to the work process is revealed to the viewer. The painting is no longer only a still image of its combined layers, but has suddenly become activated by the video; through the video the narrative of how the painting is made is demonstrated, and the viewers’ subjective translation of the painting is tested.
By showing the artwork in a private and intimate space the viewer has the opportunity to get a different exhibition experience and hopefully a feeling of a more private encounter with the artwork.
Anna Taina-Nielsen
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Biography
She holds a MFA from the Royal Institute of Art in Stockholm (2015), and has been living and working in Copenhagen since 2016 The Non-Seen Stage will be her first solo exhibition in Stockholm since her Master’s degree show Full Time Work at Galleri Mejan in 2015.
In her work, Anna Taina-Nielsen, investigates the performativity of painting and of how the body becomes the machine or tool within the working process.
Through performance, or by photographing and video documenting the painting process, she perceives the repetitive actions of her systematic way of painting as a reference to everyday actions that the daily working life contains. In her art practice she questions the value of art production and what the main artwork is – is the artwork perceived to be the painting, the documentation of the process, or the process itself?
Taina-Nielsen has recently finished a three-month-long artist in residence-programme at Leipzig International Art Program in Germany. She is invited to exhibit in Århus (DK) and Hamburg (DE) during 2020 in collaboration with the Goethe Institut.
Beside working within her own art practice, Taina-Nielsen is also active as a curator in the artist-run project space Eksrummet in Copenhagen.
