Visitations: Art, Agency and Belonging

This on-site symposium, held at the Reykjavík Art Museum on 22 October 2022 from 1-5 PM, will be a closing event for Bryndís Snæbjörnsdóttir and Mark Wilson’s award-winning project, Visitations:Polar Bears Out of Place (2019-2022). As special guests of the artists, and contributors to the new Snæbjörnsdóttir/Wilson monograph, Debatable Lands, artists Mark Dion (US) and Terike Haapoja (US/Finland) will discuss their own work. Along with Bryndís and Mark, they reflect on shared and disparate themes and approaches to art and the environment. Key themes will be what all four artists see as art’s capacity for mischievous disruption and serious catalytic effect in times of crisis – furthermore, art’s unlimited potential in sparking dynamic connections across other disciplines and fields – in science, museums, academia, popular culture and media.

The programme also includes presentations from Visitations curator Æsa Sigurjónsdóttir, Visitations project manager Ólöf Gerður Sigfúsdóttir and Visitations co-investigator Kristinn Schram. The symposium will end with a panel discussion between Snæbjörnsdóttir/Wilson, Mark Dion and Terike Haapoja, chaired by the museum’s chief curator, Markús Þór Andrésson. Hulda Stefánsdóttir, Dean of Academic Development, will open the Symposium on behalf of Iceland University of the Arts, Visitation’s host institution.

The project‘s final exhibition, Visitations: From Greenland to Iceland to Alaska in Borderless Arctic Seas, will be on view at Anchorage Museum, one of the project partners, October 7, 2022 through September 3, 2023.

The symposium is held in relation to the exhibition Down Иorth, on display at the same time at Reykjavík Art Museum, where the works of Bryndís and Mark can be seen in context with other artists from the North.

Snaebjornsdottir/Wilson homepage
The event on the museum homepage