Speculative Gatherings
Artists
Alqumit Alhamad
alqumit@gmail.comAlqumit Alhamad (b. 1992) is born in Jordan and raised in Cyprus and Syria, based in Sweden. Alhamad’s artistic practice is deeply rooted in an understanding of displacement, reflecting the experiences of a war refugee. His work explores themes such as rootlessness, diaspora, storytelling, queerness, and renewal. Thriving at the intersection of the diverse cultural landscapes that he grew up in.
The art project materializes as an installation, taking the form of a 2 x 2 meters cube enveloped in a "Dictatorship Blue." Situated prominently within the center of a space, the cube is intentionally designed to be cryptic, prompting individuals to discern the entry mechanism and subsequently explore its internal contents. No signs, texts, or warnings, just as if you are caught up in a sudden foreign invasion. Complementing a sound featuring a humming lullaby component is installed to evoke both curiosity and intimidation and serve as a method of interrogation and forewarning.
alqumit.com
Alqumit Alhamad, Lament of Warefare, digital design of the installation, 2024
Ida Bomm
ida.bomm@posteo.deIda Bomm is a research-based artist with an additional educational background in pedagogy. She is currently based in Gothenburg, Sweden. In her practice, she departs from the historical medium of painting, which she uses as a tool to encounter alternative pasts and a strategy to initiate collective speculations on futures through imagination and empathy.
This ongoing research project aims to critically investigate the historical medium of painting as a practice of individualism and human mastery. Acknowledging materials as nonhuman collaborators and perceiving them beyond their visual properties become methods to narrate the history of painting, inextricably linked to a western history of growth and capitalism, differently. Perspectives of the project are shown as collaborative pigment collection. Moreover, Ida invites you to join us for a dinner in which we will propose painting as a strategy for the commons.
instagram.com/ida_bomm
agitatedpainting.cargo.site
Ida Bomm, Making of and thinking through pigments, 2024
Sam Druant
sam.druant@gmail.comSam Druant focuses on exploring feminist themes in her artistic practice through the lens of magical thinking. She delves into the intricacies of everyday struggles and societal expectations, weaving them into alternative worlds. Her work often departs from personal experiences, expanding and transforming as they intersect with multiple references, ultimately evolving into artistic projects.
Sam’s project is trying to counter individualistic and androcentric society, with a focus on hormones and reproductive care. Looking at the research of Silvia Federici, she realized how capitalism played a significant role in the lack of knowledge, funding and development for this care. The loss of commons led to less land for people to come together in a safe space. The installation is a reaction to this and wants to offer a common space, to share experiences, tips and references. The intent is not to heal individuals but to create room for imagination around this topic and build connections.
samdruant.com
instagram.com/samdruant
Sam Druant, detail of 'Setting the Stage', 2024
Karen Froede
+46-(0)735-454530Karen Froede often describes her role as an artist as being the bridge between science and art, between the factual and the emotional. She has a multidisciplinary background and a deep commitment to humanism and sustainability. Karen places great importance on the unique and natural possibilities of a site and rediscoverable art. In the last decade, she has created over 40 public artworks.
The Baroque Parallel by Karen Froede investigates the problems with "Big Tech's" use of mass behaviour modification to encourage overconsumption, leading to climate change and planetary destruction. Froede´s work reveals a striking parallel both historically and visually, between ongoing "Surveillance Capitalism" and the Baroque era of the late 16th to mid-18th centuries, when the Catholic Church used emotionally strong Baroque expression to control and modify people's behaviour. At Speculative Gatherings, you can explore these themes through photographs and the participatory performance.
www.karenfroede.com launchofre.org @karenfroede_studio
Karen Froede, still from the Baroque Parallel - the performance. 2024
Ville Hulling
ville.hulling@gmail.comVille Hulling (b. 1999) is an explorative artist and filmmaker from Matfors. With a background in filmmaking and visual communication, he chooses not to be limited to specific mediums as a way of keeping his experimental possibilities open. Through mostly (but not only) VR, painting, animation, cryptography, music and programming he explores concepts of glitch, anticommunication and art in scientific research.
As his masters project, Hulling has created a method called Haunted by Glitches. The method has been created as a way of exploring what can be found if one stops focusing on an end goal and starts seeing all that goes “wrong” as a new exciting path to follow. In Speculative Gatherings this method and its results will be shown in multiple ways. However, due to the unexpectedness of the method not even Hulling knows exactly what shapes it will take.
villehulling.com
instagram.com/ville_hulling_art
youtube.com/@HauntedbyGlitches
Ville Hulling, work in progress VR experiment, 2024
Dominika Kemilä
kemila@dominikakemila.comDominika Kemilä (b.1985, Karlstad) is a contemporary artist and researcher working in the media of performance, sound, video, sculpture, painting and photography. Kemilä works with topics on annihilation and belonging and investigates hidden aspects of prison camps, executions and exile. Her work has been shown internationally and is represented in the collection of Värmland Art Museum, Sweden.
Enemy of the people is a monument in motion which investigates the criminalised memory of the mass killings of the Karelian indigenous people in the Soviet Union. Using the Soviet secret police’s archive material Kemilä searches for ways to embody the concealed experiences of the mass killings. Through performance, sound recordings, speech and writing the act of remembering is done at a cemetery in Sweden, cliffs in Norway, forests in Finland, at the National Museum of Contemporary Art in Portugal and in former NKVD prison cells in Estonia.
dominikakemila.com
instagram.com/dominikakemila
Dominika Kemilä, 2024
Theres K Agdler
thereskagdler@gmail.comTheres K Agdler (1969) born and raised in Switzerland. She has been living and working in Sweden since 2000. She has a background as a writer and has worked as an artist since 2016. Theres K Agdler studied for her BFA at Trondheim Academy of Fine Art in Norway and the Royal Institute of Art in Stockholm. Her work revolves around questions about peripheries and centres, and how resources are distributed, both nationally and globally. Her work is research-based, manifesting as site-specific investigations using photography, film, installation, sculpture, performance, sound, and text.
The project BROTTET – the quarry/crime is an investigation into a microhistory situated in a global rhizome of capitalist structures. The project studies the effects of industrialisation and the colonialisation of the North. In the 19th century, the North of Sweden was called “Framtidslandet”, the land of the future. Yet also in this period processes of industrial and colonial exploitation began effecting land, water, and people. At Slakthuset Theres K Agdler shows a spatial installation with sound and a film.
https://thereskagdler.cargo.site/
https://www.instagram.com/theres.k.agdler/
Theres K Agdler, Fragment av ett Brottslandskap - Fragments of a quarry/crime landscape (detail) 2024
Cori Rina Oancea
hello@coririna.comAs a multidisciplinary artist, Cori Rina Oancea creates thought-provoking pieces that serve as catalysts for profound conversations about pressing societal issues such as feminism, motherhood, and gender policies. Born in Romania and now residing in Sweden, with a steadfast commitment to the contemporary and its aesthetic potentials, she consistently seeks to activate encounters around hidden and embodied vulnerabilities.
Multiplicities of Motherhood invites the audience to bring their attention to the challenging and often overlooked aspects of mothering and motherhood. The artist's goal is to tackle these issues by using vulnerability as a lens through which to interrogate gendered and cultural expectations. Recognizing that motherhood extends beyond mere action, Cori Rina sought to intertwine emotions, embodiment, and knowledge she has gathered through research to craft immersive experiences, with the aim of sparking conversations around societal oversights, hidden vulnerabilities, and mother's burdens.
www.coririna.com
instagram.com/coririnaofficial
Iza Štrumbelj Oblak
iza.irk@gmail.comIza Štrumbelj Oblak (1997) works within performative and participatory practices. Drawing inspiration from her everyday needs and desires, her projects serve as a tool for engaging with society, fulfilling aspirations, and confronting fears. By bringing art into public spaces, she aims to encourage people to question their way of living and expand the boundaries of what is possible and enjoyable.
Iza struggles to keep up with her master's studies demands of various tasks. She calls artists Lea Topolovec and Yana Deliyska, who have recently graduated to help her get there too. Blurring the line between the project’s narrative and real life, they engage in a family role-play, as guiding figures for their off-track child. Lea, the mother, believes the solution always lies within ourselves and nature, while Yana as father advocates for discipline and physical activity. Together, they will try to send Izi on the right path, hoping she will find what works for her somewhere in the middle.
instagram.com/izastrumbelj
Iza Štrumbelj Oblak, 2024
Speculative Gatherings
Slakthusområdet,
Hus A, Göteborg
10 - 18 May, 2024
10/5: Opening event 17-19
11/5: 12-18
12/5: 12-18
13/5: Closed
14/5: Closed
15/5: 12-19
16/5: 12-19
17/5: 12-19
18/5: 12-18
Instagram:
speculative_gatherings
Contact:
maddie.leach@hdk-valand.gu.se