KEEP FROZEN: ART-PRACTICE-AS-RESEARCH (THE ARTIST’S VIEW)

Hulda Rós Guðnadóttir and Stockholm-based curator Jonatan Habib Engqvist present an extraordinary book project at the bookstore Pro qm in Berlin-Mitte. The Artist’s View unites 165 illustrations of and numerous writings on the artist’s ongoing research project Keep Frozen. It discusses and reflects upon the shaped present and possible future of places like Bíldudalur, a small fishing village on the coast of Arnarfjörður, one of the Westfjords in Iceland, the central harbour of Reykjavík, the old fishing port of Essaouira on the West coast of Africa and Brooklyn’s isolated neighbourhood Red Hook.

The book is an introduction to the artist’s videos, experiments, observations, sculptures, installations and exhibitions about people and places alongside the Atlantic coast. It also presents the artist’s view on one of the most influential methods of global contemporary cultural production: art practice as research.

The second presentation extends the discussion about art practice as research to include experimental art initiatives from the south. Laila Hida and Brussels-based curator Hicham Khalidi have both conducted extensive research and realized art projects in cities like Marrakech in Morocco. Hida is the founding director of Le 18, an alternative art space in the Médina of Marrakech. Her collaboration with Magnum-photographer Susan Meiselas in the project Morocco (2013) comprised a 6-hour pop-up photo studio that served the photographer as a research tool for an exhibition about women in Marrakech. Khalidi, who curated the visual arts program for the Marrakech Biennale in 2014, speaks with the artist about her next project.