Saturday, 10 June at 2 pm We warmly welcome you to the opening of new exhibitions at Hafnarborg:

On the sea of tranquillity
Hildur Ásgeirsdóttir Jónsson
The exhibition will feature both new and older works in which Hildur Ásgeirsdóttir Jónsson weaves together weaving and painting techniques, as well as embroidery, new ink drawings and watercolours. Hildur has lived in Cleveland, Ohio, for most of her life but maintains a strong connection to her Icelandic roots. She regularly visits the country, travelling, walking and taking photographs, which she then works on when she returns home. In addition to drawing inspiration from the Icelandic landscape for her work, for several years Hildur has created series of paintings based on brain scans and celestial bodies, where hand-dyed silk threads are woven together into a velvety surface, creating a sanctuary from the hustle and bustle of everyday life.

Hildur Ásgeirsdóttir Jónsson (b. 1963) graduated with an MFA in Fine Art from Kent State University in 1995 and a BFA from the same institution in 1991. She studied fine art at the Cleveland Institute of Art from 1985 to 1988 and also studied architecture at Kent State from 1983 to 1985. Hildur's works have been exhibited widely, including at the TANG Collection, the Tibor de Nagy Gallery and the Armory Show in New York, the Museum of Contemporary Art Cleveland, the William Busta Gallery in Cleveland, as well as the Reykjavík Art Museum and the National Gallery of Iceland. In 2008, Hildur received the prestigious Cleveland Arts Prize at the Cleveland Museum of Art in Ohio, and in 2015 she received an award from The Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation.

A hesitant line
Elisabet Brynhildardóttir
Drawing is our first visual response to the world, long before we learn to write, and it functions as a kind of projection of imagination and thoughts onto material. Few artistic media come as close to the artist's raw vision as drawing; it is a direct connection to thought and simultaneously sheds light on the very intimate relationship between the person and their tool. In the exhibition, Elísabet explores the time, feeling and perception behind the drawing and the act of drawing. Or as the artist Richard Serra once said: „You don't make a drawing – you draw.“

Elísabet Brynhildardóttir (b. 1983) has taken part in a wide range of exhibitions and other art-related activities, and her works have been shown, among other places, at Kling & Bang, i8 Gallery, the Akureyri Art Museum, Verksmiðjan on Hjalteyri, and the Nýlistarsafnið. Elísabet works in a variety of media, though drawing and sculpture are the most prominent. In her work, she explores our relationship with the material world and its limits, as well as contemplating our ideas about impermanence and time.

Free admission – see you at Hafnarborg!