Reykjavík Grapevine - feb. 2020, Blaðsíða 26

The Bell Curve Of
Emotions
‘Transmutants and Emotional Curves’ plays with
feelings
Words: Sam O’Donnell Photo: Art Bicnick
Art Book
'Transmutants and Emotional
Curves' is available for purchase at
Reykjavík Art Museum, Gallerí Port on
Laugavegur, and Books in the Back
on Freyjugata.
Arnar Ásgeirsson and I meet in his
studio to talk about his new book
of illustrations. On a table is some-
thing else he poured his soul into:
carvings on giant bars of soap. I
can see he has a distinct style—an-
gular, intricate, and ancient-look-
ing. There is also a level of absurd-
ity to it. Carving a complex design
into something as impermanent
and fragile as a bar of soap has a
very dadaist feel. This style is mag-
nified in his book, wherein he ex-
plores the absurdity of how nature
plays with our feelings.
Chronic drawing
“I’ve always been a chronic draw-
er,” Arnar says, explaining he
would draw so much in school, his
teachers would take all of his paper
away, so he would draw on the ta-
ble. “This project started like that,”
he says. “The first one I drew from
this series were these two entan-
gled snakes,” he says, showing me
a print that reminds me of Ourob-
oros. He says he remembers trying
to draw how he felt when he drew
the snakes. It was such a success
that he kept doing it.
Capturing a mood
Every time Arnar would begin
drawing, he would try to capture
a mood or emotion. “But when
you’re drawing so much, you’re
also taking from something
you see that day,” he smiles and
shows me a print of another pair
of snakes, tangled up together in
what looks like a Celtic knot. “I re-
member I saw something similar
to this on an Irish pub. So I tried
to memorise it and draw it the way
I remembered it.”
Indeed, the artists draw inspi-
ration from many things he en-
counters in his daily life: Signs on
pubs, tattoos at
the pool, nature,
animals. Arnar
would take these
influences and his
mood that day and
combine them on
paper. Then he put
the drawings in an
order that fit a curve of emotions,
starting low, going high, then back
down low again.
The Læg!
Anyone who has spent a winter in
Iceland knows that there are days
of low energy and mood, where
even leaving the house can feel
like a chore. There is a word for
this feeling in Icelandic: “læg!,”
which literally means “slump.” It’s
a mood that affects thousands of
people throughout the country.
“A lot of people ask me if I’m de-
pressed when I show them this,”
he says, laughing. “Which, I’m
not.” Arnar has played with this
seasonal emotion in his book by
drawing ancient-looking snakes,
birds, flies, and crabs in a style
that is almost Lovecraftian, and
juxtaposing them with chopsticks,
cigarettes and smiley faces.
In this way, the prints are of-
ten dark and scary, but they also
have a humorous undertone. One
is a snake tangled up in itself with
the caption “but chill out.” Anoth-
er print is someone trying to hold
onto a runaway noodle with chop-
sticks. Another is an ancient magic
symbol with a smiley face on it. “I
probably drew it wrong, which is
fine,” he says with a smile.
Moving along the curve
The images also relate to one an-
other in some ways. Some will look
similar, or have the
same caption. Ar-
nar says it’s anoth-
er way the book fol-
lows a curve. “You
hit one point here
and on the way back
you hit the same
point in the curve.
It repeats itself. Sometimes you’re
on your way up, and sometimes
you’re on your way down, but you
always hit the same point.”
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“There is a word
for this feel-
ing in Icelandic:
‘læg!.’”
As an artist, he has not o"en been described as "sni#y," so we'll do that now.
Stúdíó Ólafur Elíasson
The Marshall House
Grandagarður 20
Tuesday - Sunday 12-6pm
and Thursdays until 9pm
i8 Gallery
Tryggvagata 16
101 Reykjavík
info@i8.is
t: +354 551 3666
www.i8.is
VISIT !ÓPAVO"#$
C#LT#$E HO#SES
AND EXPERIENCE

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