Image: Liljevalchs konsthall
Since the summer solstice on 21 June, artist Ylva Snöfrid has occupied Liljevalchs in Stockholm with ‘Musernas hus’, a living total artwork and cosmological spectacle that transforms the institution’s more-than-century-old building into a pictorial and performative universe.
For eight months, Liljevalchs becomes a house for the nine Muses and the four elements: earth, water, air and fire.
Liljevalchs describes ‘Musernas hus’ as Snöfrid’s largest exhibition to date.
This autumn the exhibition enters a second phase through a collaboration with director and actor Rebecka Hemse and Dramaten: on a number of occasions, actors from the Dramaten ensemble step into the work and perform scenes in which fragments of world drama are woven together with Snöfrid’s manuscript and the exhibition’s rituals. The cast and scenes change each time; participants include Danilo Bejarano, Thomas Hanzon, Hamadi Khemiri, Melinda Kinnaman and Ingela Olsson.
Snöfrid is known for performative works that push beyond painting’s conventional boundaries; within her ritualised world, painting moves between the representational and matter, while her artistic process often takes place in shared spaces and collective rituals in which she acts as an intermediary between the artwork and reality.
Snöfrid has been based in New York, Berlin, Athens and Stockholm, and has presented exhibitions and site-specific works at venues including the Istanbul Biennial, Performa in New York, Palais de Tokyo, Swiss Institute in New York, Institut Suédois in Paris, Bonniers Konsthall and Kunsthal Charlottenborg in Copenhagen. Joanna Sandell Wright, director of Liljevalchs, curates the exhibition.
