SLUTTSPILL
Island: 22 Artists on Iceland
CAVE Gallery, Russell Industrial Projects,
Ypsilanti, Michigan, USA
Curators: Amy Sacksteder and Greg Tom
As a child, I used to spend hours learning how to play chess with my father. I learned from him that chess develops memory. The game theory is difficult and I had to learn to recognize various patterns and remember lengthy variations. During the game you are focused on only one main goal ‐‐ to checkmate and become the victor. I hated the fact that my father always won although he was my mentor.
I still credit the game of chess with logical thinking and although mistakes are inevitable and chess, like life, is a never‐ending learning process. Chess teaches independence. You are forced to make important decisions influenced only by your own judgment. It promotes imagination and creativity.
It encourages you to be inventive. There are an indefinite amount of beautiful combinations yet to be constructed.
I am now married for eons and have experienced the dynamics of a long relationship with my husband and best friend. My take on the whole issue could be akin to most modern relationships, like a game of chess. Chess like any partnership, friendship reveals that the more you practice, the better you'll become at it. You should be ready to lose and learn from your mistakes.
The images in Sluttspill are tableaux…that create a storyboard about a relationship in‐flux.
A game board of chess is a test of patience, nerves, will power and concentration. It enhances your ability to interact with other people. Sluttspill is about a couple, held together in a tug of war, consisting of two players, a man and a woman wearing the same sculptural head mask that hovers over the game board. A tight knot in the middle of the tubular mask separates their head space in order to sense the other’s move...they see through a meshed material that blocks their view somewhat of the chess pieces.
The two models I chose were two Norwegian artists, a couple who willingly participated in this interactive gamble. The location that I chose was the Museum of Contemporary Art in Reykjavik, Iceland. An appropriate space since they are both visual artists. A museum is like a stage. It is in a small reading room in the museum that I luckily came across a chess table for them to interact with. The positioning of these players could be used as a metaphor for any complex system that subjects its participants to a set of binding rules under which they are compelled to play.
It keeps the viewer off guard by creating an unorthodox chess problem and gives us a sense of being caught in a mental tug of war and allows us to appreciate the underlying thematic implications of the chess motif in the narrative.
Models: Torgeir Husevaag and Catrine Thorstensen
Location: Reykjavik Art Museum is located in three different buildings. Hafnarhús is located on the waterfront in Reykjavik
CAVE Gallery, Russell Industrial Projects,
Ypsilanti, Michigan, USA
Curators: Amy Sacksteder and Greg Tom
As a child, I used to spend hours learning how to play chess with my father. I learned from him that chess develops memory. The game theory is difficult and I had to learn to recognize various patterns and remember lengthy variations. During the game you are focused on only one main goal ‐‐ to checkmate and become the victor. I hated the fact that my father always won although he was my mentor.
I still credit the game of chess with logical thinking and although mistakes are inevitable and chess, like life, is a never‐ending learning process. Chess teaches independence. You are forced to make important decisions influenced only by your own judgment. It promotes imagination and creativity.
It encourages you to be inventive. There are an indefinite amount of beautiful combinations yet to be constructed.
I am now married for eons and have experienced the dynamics of a long relationship with my husband and best friend. My take on the whole issue could be akin to most modern relationships, like a game of chess. Chess like any partnership, friendship reveals that the more you practice, the better you'll become at it. You should be ready to lose and learn from your mistakes.
The images in Sluttspill are tableaux…that create a storyboard about a relationship in‐flux.
A game board of chess is a test of patience, nerves, will power and concentration. It enhances your ability to interact with other people. Sluttspill is about a couple, held together in a tug of war, consisting of two players, a man and a woman wearing the same sculptural head mask that hovers over the game board. A tight knot in the middle of the tubular mask separates their head space in order to sense the other’s move...they see through a meshed material that blocks their view somewhat of the chess pieces.
The two models I chose were two Norwegian artists, a couple who willingly participated in this interactive gamble. The location that I chose was the Museum of Contemporary Art in Reykjavik, Iceland. An appropriate space since they are both visual artists. A museum is like a stage. It is in a small reading room in the museum that I luckily came across a chess table for them to interact with. The positioning of these players could be used as a metaphor for any complex system that subjects its participants to a set of binding rules under which they are compelled to play.
It keeps the viewer off guard by creating an unorthodox chess problem and gives us a sense of being caught in a mental tug of war and allows us to appreciate the underlying thematic implications of the chess motif in the narrative.
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Models: Torgeir Husevaag and Catrine Thorstensen
Location: Reykjavik Art Museum is located in three different buildings. Hafnarhús is located on the waterfront in Reykjavik