For a long time now Ruri has been spinning a web inspired by a theme that is dear to her heart. She documents rivers in Icelandic nature, in view of their possible, planned or current harnessing for hydro-electric power. That work has been manifested in many forms, as witness a publication which has recently appeared: Ruri - Endangered Waters. Best known of the works is no doubt her contribution to the Venice Biennale in 2003, Archive - Endangered Waters, where images and sounds of various waterfalls could be selected from a collection in a cabinet. In the latest in this series of works, Flooding -Nature Lost, which is exhibited at Start Art, she looks face-to-face at the impending danger to which she alludes in all the waterfall works: the harnessing of one specific waterfall, which is thereby obliterated from the landscape, and its water diverted to flow invisibly through turbines to generate power. The Tofrafoss waterfall used to cascade off the cliffs at Kringilsarrani, near the source of the Jokulsa river under the Bruarjokull glacier, but it vanished when the river was dammed at Karahnjukar and the Halslon reservoir formed, filling the river canyon and far more. Ruri made a record of the waterfall in all its glory, with the assistance of cameraman Fridthjofur Helgason; and now that record of the waterfall and its thundering roar forms the framework of the piece. Rather than directly documenting how the waterfall was inundated, Ruri shows the beauty of the waterfall as it was, and addresses other aspects of the hydro project. On the one hand she presents data on the statistical benefits and consequences of the harnessing of the river, while on the other she shows pink-footed geese, compelled to abandon their nesting-grounds as the water level rises in the reservoir.
Flooding - Nature Lost is a video installation which is based on the methodology of cinema and theatre, which by their nature are dramatic. In brief, the director turns to the end of the screenplay, spots the climax of the story, and invites the audience to stay in an endless repetition of that moment. The waterfall cascades down, the water rises in the reservoir, and data flow past. The leading character - the lost waterfall -thunders constantly in flashback; uncredited extras -a few mother geese -strive unsuccessfully to save their eggs; and the credit list rolls constantly onwards. Ruri handles the images almost as a stage set and characters, and she displays them to take account of the space she works with at Start Art. The observer either finds him/herself in the cinematic world, where one forgets time and place and enters the world of the film, or he/she undergoes a three-dimensional theatre experience, where the actors stand on a stage. Ruri emphasises the personification of the geese by placing flat-screen monitors like actors in the space. By projecting images onto the walls, the gallery becomes actually a part of the work.In spite of her dramatic presentation, Ruri is upfront about the serious reality of her subject. For an Icelandic observer this is a clear reference to Iceland’s most controversial development project: the debate on this issue divided the nation and left some people traumatised, feeling that Icelandic nature, and their own convictions, had suffered a brutal blow. Applying the approach of trauma counselling, Ruri the artist comes forward to grapple with what has happened, and try to understand it. She does not flinch from facing what has been done; she breaks it down into its component parts and examines them. Ideologically she is not far from her colleagues who, at various periods following wars and disasters, have felt compelled to work through the trauma of their times.
Ruri has developed an approach and aesthetic which has much in common with documentation and archives. Her subjects are often overwhelming phenomena which are beyond human understanding – either natural phenomena or works of man. Let us consider the example of Rainbow (1991), which most people have seen, as it stands outside the Leifur Eiríksson Air Terminal at KeflavíkAirport. Ruri uses multicoloured glass in a three-dimensional structure which resembles a rainbow touching the earth. Or her near-obsessive collecting of waterfalls, of which we see an example here in the Waterfall series, 2008. Ruri focuses on the middle of the cascade, preserving a fragment of an intangible whole. She seeks to create an innovative overall view of the phenomenon by building up a collection of such fragments. And this makes up an archive of natural phenomena, many of which have been obliterated or are in danger of destruction. The large-scale work Paradise? – When? (1998) consists among other things of information on individuals who were victims of the strife in Bosnia-Herzegovina. Once again Ruri’s approach is to create an overview by recording fragments, on the principle that in order to grasp and understand the whole one must examine the smallest possible fragments, and rearrange them. While Ruri’s subjects are often political in nature, she is perhaps at her most political in this aesthetic principle, which invites the observer to experience reality on new terms. But she does not conceal her keen interest in current affairs in her latest work, Existential (2008). Once again she breaks things down into their component parts and presents them in that form. On a metal “altar” stand vessels containing petroleum, maize, water and air: the essentials of life on earth today. It is for the observer to decide what overall picture he/she wants to see from the fragments.
Markus Thor Andresson
Freelance curator
Translation Anna Yates
SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY from catalogues and magazines
Press release Limpide and Archive - endangered waters colette and the Passage du Désir 2004 Michel Onfray Archive – endangered waters, Venice Biennale
Laufey Helgadottir 50. International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia Press Release
Dr. Dorothea van der Koelen Paradise? – When?1998 Grethe Grathwol Ruri, Article in North Information, Relativity, 1997
Gunnar J. Arnason Time and Order , Experimental Environment - Kuopion Tienoo – 1995 Halldor Bjorn Runolfsson Thoughts, 1992
Gunnar B. Kvaran Time and Culture, 1987
Samples below:
PRESS RELEASE
Ruri Limpide and Archive – endangered waters colette and the Passage du Désir will be presenting for the very first time in France two exhibitions by Icelandic artist Ruri, from August 30th and September 3rd to October 2nd, 2004.
Ruri, who began her career as an artist some thirty years ago, suddenly gained public notoriety at the 2003 Venice Biennale with her work Archive – endangered waters, which was installed in the Icelandic pavilion of the Giardini.
Now she is exhibiting Archive – endangered waters in Paris for the very first time, at Passage du Désir in the city’s 10th district, and Limpide, consisting of new photographic works, at colette. Archive – endangered waters is an interactive multimedia installation, an ode to nature and a meditation on its value in the modern world.
The work consists of a kind of databank of 52 waterfalls spread around the wild and magnificent heartland of Iceland and photographed by the artist from the edge of glacier torrents and rivers of crystal-clear water. The photographs have been developed on transparencies each of which is mounted between two panes of glass. Each resulting assembly is designed to slide vertically within a cold and imposing steel structure, thus creating a kind of metaphorical archiving system.
All the photographs are accurately and methodically labelled. In order to view them, the visitor draws out the solid steel frames that slide smoothly and readily with surprising ease given the weight of each element. Once it is within view, each waterfall begins to emit its own natural sounds, at the original pitch and volume. The sounds are played back with extreme realism and confer onto the image a surprising emotional presence. Once the panel is pushed back, the sound dies out.
From gentle gurgling to deafening roar, each waterfall has its own unique voice. As visitors pull the frames to and fro, they compose, or interrupt, a magnificent visual and auditive water music, with the photographs adding their limpid magnificence to the tremendous sounds resonating through the gallery.
The work reacts to the visitors’ actions. When the sound stops, a kind of anxiety takes over. We feel a symbolic and palpable awareness of the power that each of us has towards the fragile world around us.
Ruri has positioned herself both as a witness and surveyor, and has succeeded in combining technology and nature in a remarkable way. These waterfalls, whose existence is now threatened because of the planned building of a dam and hydroelectric plant, the usefulness of which is widely disputed in Iceland, are now archived just like books or documents.
The concept of time as a creative, destructive, elastic and invisible force is a factor that permeates all of Ruri’s work. Here, the time continuum of these waterfalls is threatened; we do not know whether or not they will survive and whether we will be able to continue admiring them and hearing their sounds. But if one looks beyond the immediate subject-matter – waterfalls – it is water itself that is under threat: water, the ever-flowing fount of life, is drying up, leaving behind dry sand, deserts and entire nations that are dying out. The most precious resource of the modern world, water is a major concern for humanity and the subject of countless and endless daily struggles for millions of people.
Limpide, the new series of photographic works by Ruri that is being exhibited at colette from August 30th, is directly related to Archive – endangered waters. The photographs of water and of huge waterfalls express both the transparency and beauty of water and the tremendous, intense force inherent in these waterfalls. Visitors will be able to listen to the voices of the waters while walking around the installation.
Laufey Helgadottir, an art historian and the curator of the Icelandic exhibits at the 2003 and 2005 Venice Biennale, lives in France and Iceland and represents Ruri in Paris. tel. +33 [0]1 42 49 73 95 or +33 [0]6 10 80 70 84
Details of the two exhibitions:
Archive – endangered waters Passage du Désir 85/87, rue du Fbg-St-Martin 75010 Paris, France Metro stations: Château-d’Eau, Jacques-Bonsergent or Gare-de-l’Est From September 3rd to October 2nd, 2004 Opening times: 11am to 7pm, every day except Tuesday Entry: free of charge
Limpide colette 213, rue Saint-Honoré 75001 Paris, France Metro station: Tuileries From August 30th to October 2nd, 2004 Opening times: 11am to 7pm, every day except Sunday Entry: free of charge
Laufey Helgadottir Ruri has been selected to represent Iceland at the 50. International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia
Ruri has never confined herself to a single medium in her artistic creation. She expresses her ideas through performances, sculptures, environmental art on a grand scale, or installations – all of them always based on clear conceptual premises. Her project, entitled Archive – endangered waters, which will be exhibited in the Alvar Aalto pavilion, is an interactive multimedia installation, an ode to nature and meditation on its value in our modern world. The work is a sort of databank, of waterfalls in the fantastic, pristine highlands of Iceland.
Ruri usually anchors her works in a given environment, her art thus forming part of the space in which it evolves and the spectator the reference point. Here it is the pavilion itself which has influenced the final version. The artist has modified the pavilion entrance and exit in order to produce a closed, existential space, enabling the viewer to experience more tangibly the effect of the work. It creates an interactive, physical relationship, in which the viewer becomes the mobile parameter with movements and choices affecting the appearance of the art work, giving it a stronger content and value.
The work comprises 52 photographs of waterfalls which Ruri has taken on the banks of both muddy glacial torrents and clear mountain streams. The pictures are developed on transparent film, mounted between two sheets of glass and arranged in sliding slots installed inside a huge steel frame structure, literally forming an archive of sorts. All the photographs are precisely and scientifically labelled and when a photograph is drawn out one can hear the sound of that specific waterfall.
Like a scientist, Ruri organises, researches and records, working with high precision. Just as she did in Paradise? -When? (1998), she is dealing here with contemporary events, placing herself in the position of a witness or recorder. To underline her links with the present, she employs modern technology and materials, managing to combine nature and technology in a remarkable way.
Time, or the concept of time, ephemerality and relativity are essential elements in Ruri’s art. Ever since she demolished the Golden Car with a sledgehammer in downtown Reykjavík in 1974, her works have taken a stand, sparked social debate and left a deep impression on the public consciousness. But, in addition to their political nature, her works are poetic, often with a very strong natural reference. They focus our consciousness on what is happening around us, whether this is on the battlefields of war and conflict, in the centre of our city, or in the wilderness of the Icelandic highlands. Ruri was born in 1951 in Reykjavik, where she works and lives today. She has exhibited throughout the world and is one of Iceland’s most remarkable present-day artists.
Laufey Helgadottir, a freelance art historian and curator is the commissioner for Iceland at the Venice Biennale 2003 For further information, illustrations or to arrange an interview, please contact : Laufey Helgadottir, Tel/Fax: 00-33-1-42-49-73-95 The exhibition is generously supported by the Ministry of Education, Science and Culture of Iceland and Islandsbanki.
