VORES KÆRLIGHED

The barren Icelandic landscape in VORES KÆRLIGHED ­1–3 is reminiscent of the surface of the moon. Against the starry night sky – a reference to a series of Kjartansson’s watercolours – it is at once frighteningly lonely and strikingly beautiful. For some time now, Kjartansson has been toying with the idea of empty billboards in barren landscapes, communicating no information to nobody at all. In his series of three etchings, he tests this idea on copperplates, placing the board in the landscape, knocking it over, only to put it up again in a different spot. This seemingly absurd gesture may reference the aimlessness and peacefulness of a child playing with miniature toys, or the philosophical question of whether a falling tree makes a sound if nobody is there to hear it. This openness for a range of individual interpretations, encouraged by the associative combination of text and image, is typical for Kjartansson’s artistic practice.