"spelling the wind without words", solo exhibition, Skånes Konstförening, 2023

“spelling the wind without words”
24.02 - 02.04 2023
Sven and Ellida Hjort’s Exhibition grant
Curated by Khamlane Halsackda
More details

Opening performance by Matilda Tjäder and Yen Chun Lin 24.02.2023.
Further interventions by Ruby Nilsson, Sanna Helena Berger and Rat Section over the exhibition period

In spelling the wind without words the wind becomes the artist’s shapeshifting collaborator; an antagonist at times, mender at others, – and instigator most of the time. Capricious yet quantifiable, the wind is here explored as an agent that interacts with each subject and object it interfaces with – a protagonist encountered via its material, metaphorical, sentient and infrastructural characteristics. Much like the wind, the performances that activate and intervene in the space are central to this exhibition.

A window in the gallery has been opened to make place for an aeolian harp to interact with the outside, calling in the physical presence of the wind. In the language of this harp: if there is wind, there is harmony. This assumption is however contested and interrupted by the breathing organism in which the harp is hosted, that is, the building itself and the ventilation system that penetrates its floors and rooms. These frequencies are like the lungs of a human, filled with information. By amplifying the building’s existing vibrations, it becomes an instrument and mediator of coded noise – to which the artist invites to a sedimentary listening that allows for slippages between audible and non-audible frequencies.

The small gallery has been turned into a listening space where a four-channel sound piece of field recordings and collected stories from interactions with the wind is played. To listen to the wind is also to listen to the pulse of a place – wiggling its entire body to create movement. Whilst detecting the arteries of this very space, a silhouette of the outside buildings have found their way into the room during the daylight.

spelling the wind without words is an invitation to tune in past the thin membrane of the exhibition, and to become vulnerable to subtle frequencies and deeper levels of listening.

The artist has invited collaborators to intervene with the themes of the exhibition. For the listening space, Asta Lynge has created a scenography. Additional thanks to Tim Bishop: sound technician/consultant.

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The exhibition was the result of being the recipient of Sven and Ellida Hjort’s Grant in 2022. From the jury’s statement: “Matilda Tjäder’s artistic practice is a sharp, resourceful and affective exploration of different worlds. Through experimental storytelling, Tjäder invites and delicately immerses us into new fictitious worlds, rendering bare the fickle structures of our own world. The works’ dystopian tonality collides with the poetic meditations of text, performance, sound and motion with an undercurrent of humor subtly at play. With careful attention to other sensorial dimensions than sight, Tjäder leaves room for unexpected openings within the self, where transformation and refusals are always a possibility.”