Emily Mennerdahl

2009-09-22T08:28:00.001-07:00

2008-01-02T02:11:00.000-08:00

An Atlas of Silence

2008

The results from a search for silence using mapping web-sites on the Internet are

presented in the form of a unique book work. The book serves as a historical

document with dates and weather conditions and suggests a particular history of

silence and its appearances around the world.

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2007-12-23T17:21:00.000-08:00

Untitled Postcards

2008

Fictive accounts of quiet interventions and performances. The postcards have

been distributed individually in various postcard stands in shops, museums

and tourist locations.

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2007-01-03T02:52:00.000-08:00

Emily Mennerdahl, born in Stockholm, Sweden 1980

Education:
2005-2008 MFA Studio Arts, Concordia University, Montreal, Canada
2001-2004 BA Photography (1st Class Hons) , Manchester School of Art, Manchester, U.K

Selected exhibitions and projects:

2011 Travelogue as Allegory, curated by Maja Wismer, Konstakademin, Stockholm, Sweden
2009/10 Labyrint 09 - Writings and Observations, curated by Joanna Sandell and Pia Sandström, Botkyrka Konsthall, Stockholm, Sweden
2009 What Happens When Nothing Happens, curatorial project, FOFA gallery, Montreal, Canada
2009 What Happens When Nothing Happens - Unrealised Ideas from Montreal, curatorial project , Galleri Rotor, Gothenburg, Sweden
2008 An Atlas of Searches, Espace 413, Montreal, Canada
2007 Compression MFA show, Art Mur, Montreal, Canada
White Cube on the Move, Bourget Gallery, Montreal, Canada
2006 Hidden Connections,curated by Christin Wahlström, Pannhuset, Mariestad and Galleri Rotor, Gothenburg, Sweden
2005 Home Life, curated by Lyn Cluer Coleman, Stroud House Gallery, Stroud, U.K
2nd International Artist Book Fair, Seoul, South Korea
2004 LAB04, Institute of Contemporary Art, London, U.K
2003 Evidence of Time, Urbis Exhibition Centre, Manchester, U.K

Residencies

2012 (upcoming) Rhizome, Lijiang Art Centre, China
2009 Artist residency at the Banff Centre, The Wanderer, Banff, Alberta, Canada
2008/2009 Independent Study Programme at Valand School of Art, Gothenburg, Sweden

Grants and awards:

2011 Helge Ax:son Johnsons Stiftelse
2009 IASPIS, International Artist Studio Program in Sweden, International Cultural Exchange
2009 Diane Hobson Scholarship
2008 CIAM (Centre Interuniversitaire de Arts Mediatiques) development grant, Montreal, Canada
2007 Graduate Fellowship for MFA studies, Concordia University
2006 International Fee Remission Award for MFA studies, Concordia University
2004 Travel Bursary, Manchester Metropolitan University

Publications and texts:
2009 What Happens When Nothing Happens, exhibition catalogue, edited by ISG, ISBN 978-91-633-4838-9
2008 The Belgo Report, Bettina Forget, http://bettinaforget.com/TheBelgoReport/?m=200805
An Atlas of Searches, Nuria Carton de Grammont Lara
2007 Compression, MFA Show, catalogue
2006 Hidden Connections, Mariestads bladet, June 2006,
2003 Evidence of Time, Manchester Metropolitan University Newsletter, June 2003 Issue No.69

Teaching:

2008-present Associate Lecturer (pt), Photography Department, Manchester School of Art, Manchester, U.K

2008-2009 Teaching Assistant, Valand School of Art, Gothenburg, Sweden

2005-2008 Teaching Assistant, Studio Arts, Concordia University, Montreal, Canada

Collections:
Manchester Metropolitan University. Private collections in Holland and Sweden

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2007-01-02T10:55:00.000-08:00

Searching for Silence

2006

For one afternoon Keiko agreed to be my sandwich board lady. The text on her

white board read: "Searching for silence found no exact matches, searching for

anything that sounds like silence found three places". For several hours Keiko

walked on an impossible search across the city.

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2006-01-02T09:30:00.000-08:00

Eight Untitled Islands

2006-2008

Drawings based on maps of islands to which it is common that the Swedish

chaffinch migrates (a tiny bird whose female migrates alone from Sweden to

the north of the U.K). Drawn by silverpoint on claybound paper. Over time the

silver will oxidize, leaving the marks to tarnish into slight brown lines and

slowly begin to fade and disappear.

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2005-01-02T11:25:00.000-08:00

Kallocain for Violin

2008

Using a set of instructions on how to make words into music (invented by the artist) the

dystopian novel Kallocain by Karin Boye was translated into musical notes. The

translation was displayed and exhibited and on one occasion during the exhibition

musician/artist Cara Sawka played a part of the book on her violin.

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2000-12-20T05:46:00.000-08:00

A Topography of Sea, 2010

(excerpts from video shown here 05:18 min)

HDV two-channel video, 16:45 min

This work takes as a starting point the portrayal of a landscape and a consideration of the relationship we sustain to a specific place. It continues to explore the construction of an image; the cinematic and the photographic as well as the structure of narrative and language.

The video is filmed in a fishing village on an island off the west coast of Sweden. However, the intention was always to create an anonymous and isolated landscape. It is evident that we are somewhere in the north yet exact time or place cannot be defined. It is filmed with long uninterrupted takes, taking the moving image into the direct stillness of a photograph. Long shots are used to create a pause within time and a correlation between stasis and mobility, movement and arrest. The imagery shifts from interior to exterior, portrait to landscape. The common denominator is the absence of movement and an austere sensibility.

The narrative is non-linear and there is no obvious end or beginning. A young woman narrates the script in Swedish with subtitles in English. As the story unfolds we understand that the voice and subtitles are not in sync. Telling the same story in different languages a narrative unfolds about a mother and a daughter, landscape, belonging, loss , absence and time.

The video is approximately 16 minutes long and runs on a loop so the piece can be viewed at any time when installed in a gallery. It is edited for both a screening and as an installation in a gallery.

Credits:

Written, directed, edited: Emily Mennerdahl

Camera: Kristoffer Sandberg

Voice: Cecilia Nygren

Actor: Veronique Malo

Sound editing: Stephen Lilly

Produced with the assistance of IASPIS during a residency at The Banff Centre and Filmcentrum Stockholm

2000-12-10T05:31:00.000-08:00

Objects

2007-

Micro-sculptures of trials and attempts to "materialise" silence,

using ceramic, bronze and wax.

Untitled. Casts of the inside of an ear. Raku ceramics, 4 x 2 cm. 2009

A Failed Monument to Silence. Used foam earplugs cast into bronze. 3 x 1 cm. 2007

One Week of Silence. 7 pairs of wax earplugs formed into a ball. 4 x 4cm. 2008

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2000-09-22T13:10:00.000-07:00

The Independant Study Group is a curatorial collaboration that was formed in 2008 together with artist

Veronique Malo. Veronique and myself started working together whilst on a residency programme at

Valand School of Art in Gothenburg. Our first curatorial project What Happens When Nothing Happens was

shown at Galleri Rotor in Gothenburg and FOFA gallery in Montreal. As curators/artists our interests focus

on the importance of process, of unedited ideas, sketches; everything and nothing that happens

inbetween. We focus not on what will be but on what is.

Please visit the ISG web-site for more info.
www.independantstudygroup.com

What Happens When Nothing Happens, FOFA Gallery, 2009

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2000-09-21T15:57:00.000-07:00

An Atlas of Searches

Written by Nuria Carton de Grammont Lara, PhD Cand. Concordia University. Translated from French to English by Stacey Brown.

Essay that accompanied the exhibition An Atlas of Searches, Montreal 2008

An Atlas of Searches is an installation that examines the geographic and physiognomic dimensions of silence. Influenced by the serenity of the Scandinavian landscape, Emily Mennerdahl subtly elaborates her work by way of a feeling of belonging to a territory, real or imagined, within which the horizon, saturated with nature’s infinite essence, erases every last trace of noise. Her work explores the spatial-temporal coordinates of silence in different ways, bringing into play the Internet, maps, micro-sculpture and also music. Cartography then becomes a tool that spatializes the desire to discover where silence dwells, while the rendering of letters into music defines the temporal nature of this research.

The study of the migratory patterns of the Swedish chaffinch that lives in Scandinavian countries, and of which only the female migrates during winter to forests in England, is at the root of the drawings « Eight Untitled Islands (from a study of the migration route of the Swedish Chaffinch) ». These geographic quasi-translucent forms are evidence of a voyage towards unknown lands, because while searching for new horizons, the birds go astray in these islands due to the impossibility of finding their way. Emily draws the silhouettes of their new migratory routes with the help of a silver nib that leaves indelible metallic particles on the paper. These enduring traces are the imprints of our relationship to certain places that, for one reason or another, remain unequivocally in our memories. With the passing of time, and through the chemical reaction known as oxidation, these drawings will change shades as they slowly fade, thus arriving at an image that differs from what it once was. Like the birds’ new routes, the piece moves towards a malleable destiny that is unknown to our eyes, that is to say unpredictable.

How do you map « silence » ? On a table is the piece An Atlas for Silence that seeks to expand upon this question. On the blank pages of a book of encyclopedic proportions, Emily has transcribed the geographic points of reference for the word « Silence », found in multimap.com over the course of a six-month period. Delivering not the mapped representation of the sought-after landscape, but simply the topographic information of its multiple locations, this reference tool allows one to position the exact coordinates of « Silence ». By indicating the location, the local climate and the closest modes of transportation, this tool collects the specific characteristics of each place and preserves the main clues of its existence. The simple coordinates preserved in this atlas identify the physiognomic traits of the many un-mapped landscapes, of the silent images that remain in our imagination.

Two peculiar figurines are placed on an enclosed stand that protects them, isolates them, like a display case showing precious objects. A Failed Monument to Silence is an encased monument that can be seen but not touched. In this micro-setting, Emily displays two foam earplugs that she has had recast in bronze by a goldsmith. At the very moment that these earplugs were transformed into metal, it was not their original form they retained, but the twisted form of having once been placed in the ears. This failed experiment immortalizes the memory of these objects that absorb sound, creating a fabricated silence and a pleasantly artificial atmosphere.

How do you translate literature into music? Is it possible to render in music a literary work? How to Make Words Into Music is dedicated to the exploration of this endeavor. Using a system she has invented, Emily translates all the words in the novel « Kallocain », by the Swedish author Karin Maria Boye, into musical notes (Do-C, Re-D, Mi-E, Fa-F, Sol-G, La-A, Si-H) that can be played by any instrument. Language thus becomes a score, sonic matter, to whose melody we do not listen. It is left to us to imagine the sound of this music that organizes, even structures the temporal dimension of, silence.

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2000-02-22T10:50:00.000-08:00

News / Findings / Walks

A big source of inspiration, a book that I keep on returning to. WRITINGS by Agnes Martin

Thinking a lot about mountains and formulating a new project about

Shangri-La together with Jonas Böttern (www.jonasbottern.com)

which will take place at Rhizome Art Centre in China 2012.

(thank you Jo for book recommendation)

FILMCENTRUM STOCKHOLM, October 2010

Sitting working at Filmcentrum Stockholm, editing my video A Topography of Sea.

Check out Filmcentrum

http://sthlm.filmcentrum.se/in-english/

GUM BICHROMATE WORKSHOP at Manchester School of Art, U.K, July 2010

In July I held a Gum Bichromate Workshop for students at Manchester School of Art. Gum Bichromate is a photographic printing process invented in the early days of photography when it was discovered that dichromates are light sensitive and that colloids such as gelatin and gum arabic become insoluble in water after exposure to light. We were pretty lucky with the weather and made some really beautiful prints.

THE BOOK PROJECT at Manchester School of Art - more info coming soon

Winter walk # 23

(and a beautiful book recommended by a friend that I keep returning to.....Findings by Kathleen Jamie)

Labyrint 09 Writings and Observations

7 November -13 March 2010

at Botkyrka Konsthall, Stockholm.

Curated by Joanna Sandell and Pia Sandström

http://www.botkyrka.se/botkyrkakonsthall/utstallningar/aktuellautstallningar/49790.html

The Wanderer, Artist Residency at The Banff Centre, Canada. October and November 2009. http://www.banffcentre.ca/va/

What Happens When Nothing Happens at FOFA Gallery, Montreal, September 2009. Curated together with Veronique Malo with The Independant Study Group.

http://fofagallery.concordia.ca/ehtml/2009/09what%20happens.html

Valand Studio at The Independant Study Programme, spring 2009. Flags in Berlin summer 2009

http://valand.gu.se/

2000-01-03T02:45:00.000-08:00

Emily Mennerdahl is a visual artist working in video, subtle interventions/performances, sculptures and artist

books. Her works are conceptual explorations about landscape and belonging. She is currently based in

Stockholm, Sweden where she is originally from. She holds an MFA in Studio Arts from Concordia University,

Montreal, Canada and a BA (Hons) in Photography from Manchester School of Art, Manchester, U.K. Emily's

work has been included in exhibitions in the U.K, Sweden and Canada and she is the recipienct of several

awards. She is a founding member of the curatorial project The Independant Study Group and works part

time as Associate Lecturer in photography at Manchester School of Art in the U.K.

C.V

Contact: emennerdahl at gmail dot com
+46 (0) 707 44 53 71

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