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Artists in Iceland
Emilia Telese describes Icelandic solutions to artists’ interaction.
When I visited Iceland in early June to give a paper about NAN at the Sensi-Able Spaces conference, I saw a country whose small population has developed a deliberate way of interacting with each other and the world, and a defined identity. It was little surprise to see this reflected in its compact but well formed network of artists’ organisations and initiatives. One example is the Living Art Museum, a non-profit gallery founded in 1978 and run by an artists’ association. The museum organises about ten exhibitions a year as well as showcasing live art and other stage events such as readings, conferences and concerts. Other initiatives, such as artist-run spaces Kling & Bang, started in 2003, and Gallerí Hlemmur in 1999, are more recently formed, and display work by emerging artists. What was interesting, though, was how Icelandic artists have built a web of different artists’ associations, which have formed a collective hybrid between an artist-run spaces network and a trade union. The Association of Icelandic Visual Artists – SíM, chaired by Áslaug Thorlacius, includes The Society of Icelandic Artists (FIM), The Icelandic Printmakers...
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