Reykjavík Grapevine - feb. 2021, Side 20

Hot Do%s, Don%s and
Woolly Ton%ues
&rúrarí’s quest to create a better sweater
Words: John Pearson Photos: Art Bicnick
Workshop
Check it out at the Museum of
Design and Applied Art until May 25th
$rúrarí certainly has a fascination
with the squishier, more interest-
ing parts of the
human body.
The textile
designer first
piqued the inter-
est of many last
year with her
striking, tongue-
adorned knitted face masks—her
creative response to the sudden-
ly omnipresent anti-pandemic
measures. But even before that,
$rúrarí—the artist-name of $r
Jóhannsdóttir—was notable for
her signature lippy, mouthy, wool-
ly sweaters. Not to mention her
beautiful phallic scarf and vulval
purses which, of course, must be
mentioned.
“Body parts have become a big
theme. I'm not sure why!“ she
laughs. “But it just happened. It's a
difficult question to answer; I am
still looking for the answer myself.“
This was not supposed
to be a thing
$rúrarí’s unnerving face masks
thrust her into the international
spotlight. Each one produced in
the series was snapped up by a
museum, looking to record this
weird period of human history via
a slice of creative zeitgeist.
“I was not expecting this many
people to react to the masks, be-
cause they were not supposed to
be anything,“ $rúrarí says. “It was
meant to be just a small series of
sculptures on how face masks
could be. But it was fun to wear
them. And they were also imply-
ing that people should stay away
from you!”
But long before her cun-
ning lingual creations captured
our imaginations, $rúrarí was
knitting together two Icelandic
icons—the woolly sweater and the
humble hot dog. The name of that
project, Peysa Me! Öllu, (Sweater
With Everything), toys with the
Icelandic phrase “pylsu me! öllu”,
which is how you order a hot dog
with all the sauces
and trimmings.
For that project,
$rúrarí took sweat-
ers which had been
donated to the Red
Cross but were re-
jected as unsuitable
for sale—many due to overenthu-
siastic pylsu consumption. “The
name of the project comes from
the fact that lots of the sweat-
ers had stains on the front, after
someone had eaten a hot dog and
spilled the sauce,” she explains.
$rúrarí’s imagination was
sparked as to how these “unus-
able” sweaters might be resus-
citated and turned into valuable
items, leading her to create patch-
es and decorations to cover the
holes and stains. She focused on
the hot dog theme—sausages and
buns, mustard and ketchup—and
of course, mouths to eat it all.
“I like to make something both
funny and practical,” she explains.
“Like a mouth-pocket that you can
drag inside out, and it becomes a
tongue!”
Everything for
everybody
The success of Peysa Me! Öllu—
helped by public love for her
pimped sweaters from high-pro-
file fans such as Erykah Badu—
gave rise to $rúrarí’s current
project, a residency at Iceland’s
Museum of Design and Applied
Art.
The project, entitled Peysa Me!
Öllu Fyrir Alla, (Sweater With Ev-
erything For Everybody), takes her
sweater-rescue work out into the
community.
“I have so many sweaters, and I
will never be able to fix all of them!
They’re still piling up at the Red
Cross,” says $rúrarí.
“So I will have workshops
where people can mend a sweater
then keep it, use it and make it
last,” she continues. “The idea is
that everyone can join in and be
part of the design process. I have
some good mending books here,
so they can browse and find an
interesting technique that works
for their sweater. Then they can
sit here with me and be part of my
studio.”
And $rúrarí harbours ambi-
tions to make her sweater rescue
activities international.
“I'm hoping to take it further
in the future,” she says. “Maybe
I could even go abroad. There's
probably ruined sweaters every-
where, I will just have to figure out
where to get them in each place.”
So get your woolly on, spill
some messy food down the front
and think which squishy body part
you’d most like to cover the stains.
$rúrarí is on her way to help you
pimp your saucy sweater.
Arti8 Gallery
Tryggvagata 16
101 Reykjavík
info@i8.is
t: +354 551 3666
www.i8.is
ANDREAS ERIKSSON
4 February - 3 April 2021
30.01.–09.05.2021
Ragnar
Axelsson
Where the World is Melting
Hafnarhús
Tryggvagata 17
+354 411 6410
artmuseum.is
Open daily
10h00–17h00
Thursdays
10h00–22h00
"Body parts have
become a big
theme. I'm not
sure why!”
Cool as a cucumber (hands not actual cucumbers)