Arna Óttarsdóttir Afterimage Textile Art Exhibition at i8 Gallery in Reykjavík

In her third solo exhibition with i8 Gallery, Arna Óttarsdóttir presents three major new weavings that explore the intersection of digital manipulation and traditional handcraft. The works feature a deeper, darker color palette than her previous pieces, drawing inspiration from the harshness of Icelandic winter light and personal journal sketches.

Afterimage marks the inauguration of i8 Gallery's newly renovated space at Tryggvagata 16 in Reykjavík. The exhibition features three monumental weavings, representing the artist's largest scale to date. Through these works, Óttarsdóttir explores the dualities of light and darkness, specifically referencing the contrast between the harshness of Icelandic winter nights and the long, bright days of summer. The tapestries utilize a rich, dark warp, a departure from her usual un-dyed structural threads, to evoke the enveloping nature of winter. Her process remains a complex intersection of the digital and the manual. Óttarsdóttir begins by sketching in a journal, isolating pages and manipulating their proportions digitally through a redaction process. These compositions are then meticulously handwoven using a variety of materials including wool, cotton, linen, and silk. The resulting works challenge the boundaries between abstraction and figuration, with the original notebook pages becoming increasingly intangible as the compositions undergo further deconstruction in their final, large-scale textile forms.

The gallery is open to the public; please contact i8 Gallery for further visit information or to enquire about specific works on display through their official website contact page.