Reykjavík Grapevine - 31.07.2015, Síða 50

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Donnets are a new department of Bjarni’s
Visio Academy, a system for the study of
visual language that began as a theory in
rhyme, words and symbols when he was
in art school in the mid-70s. They are also
part of a new field of visual studies in-
vented over the course of his lifetime as
an artist, called Visualogy, for which he's
developed an extensive grammar and vo-
cabulary. His “birthday” as a visualogist
was just the day before our meeting.
Bjarni arrived promptly, as I was told
to expect from him, and deferred getting
a cappuccino until after our interview.
Seated in front of the framed ‘donnets’, he
began by talking about them as “a new vi-
sual art form.”
You are invested in the Icelandic
language. I'm curious to know
about the word 'donnet' which
comes from sonnet, a musical term
originating in Italy.
The sonnet in Italy started the Italian
Renaissance and 27 years ago I started
a renaissance in Iceland by making new
manuscripts based on my Visualogy. I had
been making a new philosophy, a new art
style, a completely new way of thinking in
the field of visual arts.
Do the donnets connect to vi-
sual music, for example work that
started with Kandinsky in painting,
or Hans Richter in film?
Visual music?! I don't think this has so
much to do with visual music because a
donnet is a silent poetry. Music is not si-
lent.
But the donnets have visual rhythm
and flow very much like how po-
etry has rhythm, flow, and melody
in words...
I'm working in art, science, and philoso-
phy, mainly in the field of visual arts. I
started with a poem that I realized was vi-
sual poetry. Donnets are Visual Construc-
tive Poetry but I work with nature in these
works. The financial catastrophe affected
me strongly.
Is this the 'fit of rage' you refer to in
another interview in relation to the
beginning of donnets?
My heart was deeply sinking into sorrow.
I had to do something about it and this is
my way of trying to conquer the sorrow
and to get back my passion and happiness
through creating.
The donnets appear to be linking
the fields of visual music and
landscape photography, with the
catalyst of the financial crisis being
their starting point. How are they
contextualized within the canon
of healing anger, and sorrow, and
loss in relation to the homeland
by going back to the land, which is
a very deliberate theme explored
by landscape photographers and
painters?
There must be some kind of guys stealing
these sorts of things but I am not! I don't
have to go to a catalogue or canons to
make my art! I am an independent artist!
You are not interviewing an art historian!
I don't have a perfect explanation because
it is so new since I've been working on
this. The project has only been going for
five years, and I've made 500-600 of these
pieces. I see the silence in these works and
I like that silence.
It appears you are working with
the serendipity in nature and re-
arranging it whereby one element
of the landscape in one image
flows into the next. For example,
how the ridgeline of a mountain
in one photograph continues into
the edge of a cloud in the adjoining
photograph. There is deliberate
rhythm from one image to the
next, but then a melody that flows
through the entire piece by the
nature of your composition. You
speak of poetry and of silence, but
poetry is not silent.
Why do you think tourists come to Ice-
land?! They come for the silence.
ART
EXHIBITION
Take A Look At New Iceland
We chat with Bjarni Þórarinsson about his Donnets
16 June - 19 September SPARK Design SpaceKlapparstígur 33New Iceland
On an exceptionally warm and sunny summer day, I met Bjarni Þórarinsson at Spark Design
Space where his work, New Iceland, is currently on view. New Iceland is made up of donnets,
which Bjarni describes as a visual counterpart to sonnets. They are a grid of photographs
taken with disposable cameras around Iceland over the course of days, months, and years.
The pieces are then “composed” of varying shots from the same location, and each image in
the grid is uniquely identified much like on a contact sheet, but on the backside and in the
artist’s beautiful hand-written script.
Photo Xárene Eskandar
Words Xárene Eskandar
6
The Reykjavík Grapevine
Issue 11 — 2015