Jónsi’s FLÓÐ (Flood) is a spatial scent and sound sculpture that conjures a cataclysmic occasion. Within the gallery, we’re transported to the ocean. The scent of seaweed, tinctured and distilled by the artist, fills the air and a fragile mist touches our pores and skin. By means of the haze overhead, gentle penetrates the “
At the moment on view at Reykjavík Artwork Museum Hafnarhús, FLÓÐ is considered one of three works within the artist’s eponymously titled exhibition—his first in Europe. FLÓÐ was created for Seattle’s Nationwide Nordic Museum in 2023, and the presentation in Reykjavík marks its second set up. Although it debuted in one other coastal metropolis 3,600 miles away, FLÓÐ has been embraced in Reykjavík, the capital of Jónsi’s residence nation and Seattle’s sister metropolis. This connection between Reykjavík and Seattle was front-of-mind for Jónsi when he conceived of FLÓÐ.
As the curator who commissioned FLÓÐ for the Nationwide Nordic Museum, I mentioned this relationship with Jónsi through the web site go to that will inform its creation. The behind-the-scenes journey of curatorial commissions is never mentioned. But, a piece’s curation historical past can shine a light-weight on the intentions behind its earlier and present show, in addition to its resonance for viewers. In January 2020, I flew to Los Angeles to go to Jónsi’s first exhibition with Tanya Bonakdar Gallery. I first discovered of Jónsi’s work as a visible artist via artwork critic Gregory Volk’s Hyperallergic overview, “Looking for the Soul of Iceland,” revealed the month prior. Jónsi has been a visible artist for many years, and Volk rightly characterised his work as a pure extension of his contributions as a performing artist—he’s the lead vocalist for the internationally acclaimed post-rock band Sigur Rós—and within the inventive medium of scent. After I arrived on the gallery, I hung out with Hvítblinda (Whiteout), Svartalda (Darkish Wave) and Í blóma (In Bloom) (all created in 2019), three multisensory installations that seize the advanced pure setting and historical past of Iceland. Hvítblinda, a pristine white dice with two elevated platforms, calls to thoughts whiteout circumstances. The scent of ozone permeates the air, whereas discipline recordings of wind and snow accompany the artist’s personal vocals. Instantly, I made a decision that the museum should convey Hvítblinda to Seattle.
Conversations commenced with the artist. But, the continued uncertainty attributable to the Covid-19 pandemic made it troublesome to set exhibition dates. Within the meantime, his second solo gallery present debuted: Hrafntinna (Obsidian), an immersive set up imagining the real-life eruption of Iceland’s Fagradalsfjall volcano in 2021. On the time, we deliberate a web site go to. Jónsi and his studio supervisor Damon arrived in Seattle a few months later. We toured the museum, which is located within the working waterfront of Seattle’s Ballard neighborhood. We drew comparisons between the cities and their vibrant fishing communities, and I famous Seattle’s longtime relationship with Reykjavík. (They turned sister cities in 1986.) The following day, an concept emerged. As an alternative of putting in Hvítblinda, we’d create a brand new work, which might forecast how local weather change and sea stage rise problem the survival of coastal cities and their residents.
As Jónsi developed his inventive imaginative and prescient for FLÓÐ, his studio and my set up group labored to appreciate it within the gallery over the course of the following yr. With the help of exhibition sponsor Icelandair, I organized for the artist and his group to journey to Iceland to make discipline recordings and collect North Atlantic seaweed. In Los Angeles, Jónsi composed and recorded the soundscape, created the scent and directed the programming of a protracted LED gentle strip. On the museum, the exhibition designer and I collaborated with our amenities crew to develop a plan to maintain the set up’s seaweed scent and fog contained within the gallery of a state-of-the-art purpose-built facility, and we chosen environmentally-friendly exhibition elements in step with the group’s sustainability efforts and the art work’s message. For instance, guests can be inspired to take a seat or lie on the ground of the gallery, and we might must carpet its polished concrete flooring. We bought carpet tiles made out of regenerated nylon that had beforehand been utilized in fishing nets.
As commissioning curator, I used to be additionally the primary interpreter of this work for the general public and charged with speaking the expertise to the museum’s advertising and public relations groups. It was a brand new problem to jot down about an experiential art work through the technique of its creation, however conversations with Jónsi and his studio supervisor knowledgeable my artwork historic evaluation and understanding of the supposed customer expertise. Just a few months earlier than the exhibition was scheduled to open, Jónsi determined upon the art work’s title, and the catastrophic tenor of the piece turned clearer to me. I located this new murals inside a broader context, tracing the historical past of the idea of the chic panorama in artwork from the 18th to the twenty first centuries with FLÓÐ.
The Nationwide Nordic Museum’s opening of FLÓÐ was its largest up to now, with attendance swelling over the exhibition’s run. Guests returned repeatedly and remained within the exhibition for hours. Inspiring awe, FLÓÐ immersed guests in a chic panorama—that of a human-made future within the Puget Sound area—and reminded them of their fragility amid the forces of nature. Remark playing cards, all constructive, described stirred feelings. Guests used phrases, akin to “calming” and “therapeutic” to explain the work that additionally they acknowledged is “highly effective” and “a spiritual expertise.” Museum employees members grew so hooked up to the piece that they saved the branded sweatshirt, the design for which Jónsi and I had developed over espresso in LA, within the common rotation of their wardrobes. Previous to de-installation, I reserved two hours for employees to say farewell to the work collectively. Fortuitously, it was not my final expertise with it. I had the privilege of revisiting FLÓÐ on the exhibition preview at Hafnarhús, located close to Reykjavík’s waterfront in June. True to the earliest conversations in 2021, FLÓÐ’s affect in Reykjavík was as profound as in Seattle.
