Iceland review - 2013, Qupperneq 18

16 ICELAND REVIEW
“Memories of people and the atmo-
sphere of a small community have been
my favorite subjects right from the
beginning of my career. Searching for
some truth about our heritage and the
future of our society in the fast lane, too
busy to enjoy the passing moment. And
in the five years since the sheep project,
I have come to realize that still today,
we are so close to sheep. Iceland is still a
society of sheep farmers in that we don’t
have a metropolitan, big city mentality.
We are independent individuals to the
core. We like it but are shy about it.
When abroad, we try to fit in, to follow
the stream.”
“This is heavy,” I comment when
Aðalheiður single-handedly carries
another person to the gallery floor.
“This is my husband,” she says, “Not the
real one, this one is made of wood. For
all my sculptures I buy new timber, lots
of it, so my sculptures will last as long as
our sheep culture.”
A project of this size could never have been the work of a single
person. The 15 guest artists—Jón Laxdal Halldórsson, Guðbrandur
Sigurlaugsson, Georg Óskar Giannakoudakis, Margeir Dire, Freyja
Reynisdóttir, Gunnhildur Helgadóttir, Arnar Ómarsson, Jón Einar
Björnsson, Miriam Blakkenhorst, Arndís Bergsdóttir, Níels Hafstein,
Arna Valsdóttir, Þórinn Blöndal, Hlynur Hallsson and Nikolaj Lonentz
Mentze—added something extra to the show.
With everything in place, I think to myself that these are among the
best exhibitions I have experienced in Iceland. Maybe Aðalheiður hit
the nail on the head in defining who we truly are?
On my way to the capital, I’m still counting sheep. 
ART