STOCKHOLM.- Bonniers Konsthall presents the large autumn exhibition, New Materialism. Here, thirteen artists who work within textile, clay, wood and ceramics are gathered in a show where performative aspects and process-oriented works are provided extensive space, through installations and workshops. The exhibition pays attention to the increasing interest within the contemporary art field in crafts as a method and material, and presents new names amongst internationally acclaimed artists.

Conceptual art and crafts have long been viewed upon as opposites on a spectrum of high and low, a polarity that today appears increasingly obsolete.

The exhibition pays attention to the practice of contemporary artists and highlights questions regarding consumption and production, as well as concerning our aspiration for something tactile and physical in a digital era. A number of works shown have been unfolded from collective practices and transfers of knowledge; highlighting a process that is often reserved for the artist’s studio, that here resides in the Konsthall.

"The works in the exhibition New Materialism show that the distinction between form and content is hard to maintain and that the content also comes out of the material and is not just communicated through it. Physicality and tactility are realities that we apparently neither want to nor are able to disregard." – Magnus af Petersens, director and curator

Some of the participating artists, such as Éva Mag, Lee Mingwei, Ellen Lesperance and Theaster Gates, create works that unfold and transform during the exhibition period, through collaborations with volunteering visitors, apprentices and paid craftsmen. Here, the participation is a crucial part of the work and a prerequisite for its realization.

Katerine Helmersson and Abdoulaye Konaté, as well as Francis Upritchard and Tonico Lemos Auad, have made artworks that relate to amulets; objects and materials carrying magical qualities. Here, similarities to many new-materialist ideas can be found; materials appear almost alive, constantly changing and continuously becoming. An idea concerning the material that is aligned with animism; the belief that nature is animated.

In Andrea Büttner, Andreas Eriksson, Petrit Halilaj, Sheila Hicks and Britta Marakatt-Labbas works, the material provides a point of departure from which personal and collective memories and histories are highlighted. It concerns matters such as the memory of a material, the journey of a material between different countries or contexts, and the adaptation of a material performed by different hands – or about the human memory and how stories can be told, modified and developed through different techniques such as knitting, weaving, tailoring, clay and ceramics. Here, the sensuous, tactile and inherent qualities of the works are emphasized.

“The hand connected to the eyes and the brain. Hands, eyes, brain: it’s the magic triangulation. It comes from passion, heart and intellect inseparably cemented to your times and to your emotional experiences.
If I gave my designs to someone else, it would be their interpretation of my idea.” – Sheila Hicks