Kari Steihaug
Oslo, Norway
Kari Steihaug work with installations and found objects, with time and perishability, history and crafts as central themes. Her starting point is textiles related to everyday life, both what remained incomplete and what has been in someone’s life for a long time, used and worn. Textiles as sensuality and carriers of memory, a place to explore the relationship between remembrance and expectation, the collective and the private, and the fragile and the substantial. Her interest is to highlighten the political and poetic aspects of textiles that have been in our lives for a long time.
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Kari Steihaug (2022)
ISBN–ISBN 978-3-89790-687-7
KARI STEIHAUG
Nina M. Schjønsby (ed.)
240 pages
21 x 29.7 cm, 183 ills.
With contributions by Monica Aasprong, Ingvill Henmo, Anne Karin Jortveit, Aasne Linnestå, Halvor Nordby, Kjetil Røed, Cecilie Skeide and Kari Steihaug.
In Kari Steihaug’s art, what is overseen plays a major role. The things that have been set aside, unfinished projects, objects that are worn or frayed are all solicitously brought into the light.
Among the materials Steihaug works with are worn out woollen garments, faded curtains, discarded woollen blankets, unfinished knitwear, or fragments of glass found on the beach. She picks them up, or fetches them out of oblivion, stores them in archives and arranges them in new contexts. By embracing imperfection, the works become a counterbalance to the galloping consumer culture of our time.
Steihaug uses techniques such as knitting, darning, tufting and crocheting; she unravels garments, draws or writes with the thread allowing it to coil in new directions. In her works, found materials gain new value and expanded significance. It becomes clear to us that this material carries a multitude of stories about lived life: about love, loss, and passion. Perhaps it says something about a belief in new beginnings, an abrupt change in life or a desire to keep someone warm. The works create a room that we can immerse ourselves in, they evoke associations and memories. They cause time to open up, so that we remember things we had forgotten. Steihaug’s view of what is often considered worthless in our culture is contagious; she allows us to see with fresh eyes what surrounds us in everyday life.
In this book 25 years of her work is collected. Poetry and prose contributions provide introductions to Steihaug’s oeuvre and draw up the lines of a varied and rich practice.
Nina M. Schjønsby
Editor: Nina M Schjønsby
Design: Rune Døli, Modest
Photo: Jannik Abel, Espen Tollefsen m.fl.
Printed: Göteborgstryckeriet
Publisher: arnoldsche Art Publishers
Support: Kulturrådet, Fritt Ord, Billedkunstnernes vederlagsfond, Regionale midler, Oslo Kommune.
https://arnoldsche.com/en/product/kari-steihaug/
