June 2 – July 22, 2012
During the spring of 2012, the art and agricultural collective Kultivator invited students from grades 4 and 5 in Gnesta’s schools into a project on new ways to live. In “Gnestopia” they used Art Lab Gnesta’s large exhibition hall and created tools for shaping desirable future scenarios with a focus on form and a system to build tall structures.
Work that began in the schools then moved to Kultivator’s studio and now to the main hall of Art Lab Gnesta. The result is a sculptural building that challenges the conventional view of how we should live and house ourselves. In the completed building, children who visit Art Lab Gnesta in the summer can continue the work through play and thinking about future ways housing many people together.
Kultivator is an experimental cooperation between organic farming and artistic practice based in Dyestad on Öland. The project was supported generously by Skapande Skolan.
The exhibition runs until 22 July.
In the project room: Grass Works – Emma Göransson
In Emma Göransson’s video “Grass Works”, as shown in Art Lab Gnesta’s project space during the summer of 2012, sedge is woven by a pair of hands. Sedge has traditionally been harvested and dried in braids, and the almost ritual braiding recalls a hidden female handicraft tradition. Grass Works is a anti-monumental intervention, which in the space of a few hours disappears and returns to nature. Emma Göransson is an artist, researcher and lecturer at Konstfack (The College of Arts.)
Ö-Projekt Launched
Together with the artist Patrick Dallard, pupils from Gnesta’s schools worked creatively and playfully with water in various forms against the background of an understanding of water as a prerequisite for life. Now, in the project’s final phase, islands of recycled plastic covered with live aquatic plants are launched. During the summer, visitors are invited to enjoy this new landscape, a floating garden that blends in with a half-forgotten and overgrown corner of Gnesta.
Release: magazine Fält (Field)
In the first issue of the magazine Fält, we present the art projects displayed at Art Lab Gnesta in 2012, gathered insights from local initiatives and invited artists, and show the interpretations of writers and photographers of the year’s theme. Fält is a magazine about art, vegetation and cultivation, about the points of contact between contemporary urban culture and the countryside. Based on the art shown and created and the presentations conducted at Art Lab Gnesta we want to create a springboard for discussions concerning food production, forestry, animal husbandry, green fingers and art.
The debate continues! Exhibitions, workshops and talks will be held throughout 2012 at Art Lab Gnesta. Dinners will be held to identify ideas and trends about how we can choose differently and promote sustainable development widely. Welcome!