March 19, 2016

In her first solo exhibition in Miami, Àsdís Sif Gunnarsdottir explores altered reality in an immersive evening through interactive performance, live projection, video, and sound. Gunnarsdottir has entered the space (the bedroom) as a place to daydream, thinking about where our minds end up when we let them drift.

What is the altered state of those around us, specifically in the home? We categorize people and things because it simplifies the way we see the world around us. These inner pictures can manifest themselves into real object representation. For example, the image we form of significant others is often an image of how we wish them to be; loving and supportive, interesting, exciting, and engrossed in us alone. We struggle to prevent ourselves from becoming demonic and hostile when we find this image to be untrue.

In this special performance-based evening, we are forced to wonder whether we see things as they are, or if we actually see things as we are. Guests are given a hand-written poem by the artist to consider when they enter the performance.

Loskins matast skuggarnur okkarí

vid erum umkringd vatri

…kyrrt…Kyrd

Finally our shadows merge

Kyrru vatri

we are surrounded by water

...still water

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Ásdís Sif Gunnarsdóttir lives and works in Reykjavík, Iceland. Gunnarsdóttir studied at UCLA in Los Angeles and at the School of Visual Arts in New York. Ásdís is known for her performances that take place in unconventional places and her video installations consisting of three dimensionality and visual phsycadelic poetry. Treating videos as songs, Ásdís combines videos with live poetry readings and her art work can vary from large video installations and performances to spoken word poetry and photography. Her performance at the Berlinale film festival was called “The Abstract Prophecy Conference”. It was a 45 min long “journey to the psychedelic vastness of the feminie mind. The artist controls an abstract PowerPoint blended in with music, videos, performances and poetry”. A one woman show where she mixes video art and skype performances into the stage. Ásdís began to make performances through skype in 2007. She would do a new performance every Sunday afternoon by her computer. The audience would call in to participate. Ásdís has since then used the online medium for performance and video making, where improvising plays a big part of the art. In 2011 she made a large video installation called “Improvised, immediate past” in the show “Momentum”, she recorded a performance and did not allow herself to edit it, it was a one take and projected onto the walls, live size from 3 different angles. This way she wanted to release her control over the video medium and celebrate the “Power of now."