Da Gadderie, Shetland Museum and Archives, Lerwick, Shetland, until 3 January 2011

SHETLANDERS often think of themselves as living on the edge, and looking at UK weather maps that’s not difficult to see why. However, in Viking times Shetland, was slap bang in the middle of the action; a stopping off point for all routes east, and south.

This collaborative touring exhibition by seven artists from four countries on the Nordic ‘rim’ aims to explore their shared cultural inheritance. It’s already been to Norway, Faroe and Denmark, and this month can be seen in Da Gadderie.

A general view of the exhibition in the gallery

Taking as its title the Scandinavian word for travel, ‘i Vesterveg’, which is literally to go west, the main direction for the coastal Vikings, it’s a mixed show with some very impressive yet strangely quiet work. It’s intensely subdued in its subject matter and particularly its use, or should I say lack of use, of colour.

There’s a feeling of the minimal especially with the use of natural materials such as Málfríður Aðalsteinsdóttir’s panels of needle-stitched horsehair on wool. These delicately conjure up waves, waterfalls or, at their most simplistic, maps of the four countries involved. She was the initial catalyst for this artistic collaboration, as an impressive booklet which accompanies the show indicates.

Map in stitched linen and horsehair by Icelandic artist Málfríður Aðalsteinsdóttir

Guðjón Ketilsson from Iceland shows two contrasting sides of his work. Three drawings, intricate and skilful rendered in various media, focus on knotwork, wood carvings and, inspired by Shetland tradition, a filigree network of woven threads or wool. He then goes to the other extreme with four large sculptural wooden lighthouses based on real buildings from the different regions. Imaginatively displayed on their packing case plinths, they share the same attention to detail seen in his drawings.

Also making a scale model is Kristin Reynisdóttir though this time it’s a hut for drying fish, and there’s a lot of detail in miniature. ‘A house for nets’ is spot lit, casting an almost three dimensional shadow onto a large screen. Fishing is, of course, one of the activities shared by all the countries mentioned here. She has identified this kind of building as playing a crucial role in the traditions of this common denominator, and invested in it the same care and craft as the real thing.

Kristin Reynisdóttir's A House for Nets

Kristin Reynisdóttir’s other piece is for me less impressive. ‘Reticulation/Netja’ features five framed pieces of stomach, particularly the membrane of suet, which is a store of fat for animals, but the work shares none of the material transformation of the house for nets.

I was more impressed by Johannes Vemren-Rygh’s ‘Re-shaped wood’, more for its green credentials than anything. An African carving found in a Faroese second-hand shop became the catalyst for a work which seeks to explore the cultural and even souvenir aspects of driftwood, and makes more of a connection with travel and culture than some of the artists here.

His mythical knife and fork sets fashioned in steel, silver and horn are beautifully functional, extremely imaginative and seem to come from another world and time.

That goes equally for Barbara Ridland, one of the Shetland artists represented here. Her fine wall reliefs based on the theme of mythical sea creatures is both impressive and disturbing with their gaping orifices and strange appendages. These large sculptural pieces made from cardboard and sea grass use a straw weaving technique which suggests artefacts from a lost culture, but encompasses the traditions of island communities.

Work by Shetland artist Barbara Ridland

More contemporary-looking objects have been created by Norwegian artist Elsie-Ann Hochlin in her large relief ‘They shoot stars, don’t they’. The basic unit of her piece is constructed from plywood and put together to form a domed module. Each of the modules is then joined with plastic ties and can be arranged to fit any space.

While this sounds like something from IKEA (and indeed would fit quite nicely there), in reality it highlights the organisational character that craft can bring and looks terrific in the Museum stairwell.

A more minimalist approach can be found in the work of Shetland–based artist Roxane Permar with her four DVD films, ‘Imprints’. These show in a loop on three small screens and benefit from the different viewpoints as the actual images move very slowly. Made on location in the four different countries, the images suggest woven textiles, rigging, nets and become almost a treatise on whiteness and texture.

The show is well laid out and uses the space imaginatively with dimmer areas for projection and film. Whether it successfully captures the essence of the common cultural heritage shared by these Nordic ‘ring’ countries is debateable, but the project itself is fascinating and has borne creative fruit and, more importantly for the concept, developed new cultural networks showing these artists looking in more than one direction.

© Peter Davis, 2010

Links

• Shetland Museum and Archives