PAVILION NODICO IN BUENOS AIRES
CYCLE FESTIVAL AT PAVILION NORDICO
The exhibition ‘Reaccion A Islandia’ shows contemporary works by Icelandic visual artists, followed by a performance programme during it´s opening event . The title of the exhibition quotes the poem ‘A Islandia’ written by the Argentinian writer Jorge Luis Borges in the late 1920’s. In the poem Borges describes his fascination with Iceland’s history, the Sagas, the language and the unique nature. A fascination that now is shared by millions of tourists that visit the country yearly, making this romanticised narrative somewhat of a mainstream cliché. A cliche that is so ingrown in the natives psyche that it is hard to define the borders between reality and fiction.
‘Reaccion A Islandia’ presents a reaction to that narrative, partly build on the cliché and partly on the non spectacular, mundane reality of a nation finding its way within the global context.
Participating artists
Adam Christensen
Anna Júlía Fridbjörnsdóttir
Anna Marie Gudmundsdottir Sigmond
Anna Rún Tryggvadóttir
Arnar Ásgeirsson
Bryndís Björnsdóttir
Franziska Zahl
Gudny Gudmundsdottir
Ivalo Frank + Jessie Kleeman
Kolbeinn Hugi
Leifur Ýmir Eyjólfsson
Melanie Ubaldo
Unnar Örn
ABOUT PAVILION NORDICO
PAVILION NORDICO is the first Nordic residency & art centre in South America, opening its doors in Buenos Aires, Argentina, in early 2019. The project awards up to 10 creators with a one-month residency in a historical villa in the heart of the city, where they will have a chance to share and develop their work. In addition, a public program of exhibitions, talks and workshops held at select locations in the Nordic region, Europe and Argentina will bring together Nordic creators with local and international talent. PAVILION NORDICO was founded by Jali Wahlsten and Sara Løve Daðadóttir and is developed in collaboration with a group of Nordic and international art professionals. PAVILION NORDICO is supported by The Nordic Culture Fund and The Nordics.
“A ISLANDIA
From the regions of the beautiful earth
That my flesh and its shadow have fatigued
You are the most remote and the most intimate,
Last Thule, Iceland of the ships,
From the stubborn plow and the constant rowing,
Of the seafaring networks,
Of that curious light of still evening
Let the vague sky shine from the dawn
And the wind that seeks the lost
Viking legs. Sacred land
That you were the memory of Germania
and you rescued your mythology
From an iron forest and its wolf
And from the ship that the gods fear,
Carved with the nails of the dead.
Iceland, I’ve dreamed you for a long time
Since that morning when my father
He gave the child that I have been and that has not died
A version of the Völsunga Saga
That is now deciphering my penumbra
With the help of the slow dictionary.
When the body tires of its man,
When the fire declines and it is already ash,
Well is the resigned learning
Of an infinite company; I’ve chosen
That of your language, that Latin of the North
That encompassed the steppes and the seas
From one hemisphere and resonated in Byzantium
And in the virgin margins of America.
I know I will not know, but they expect meThe possible gifts of the search,
Not the fruit wisely unattainable.
The same will feel those who inquire
The stars or the series of numbers ...
Only love, ignorant love, Iceland. ”