Vernissage Thursday, October 9 at 5-8 PM

Participating artists
Damien Ajavon (Oslo), Hera Büyüktaşcıyan (Istanbul), Céline Condorelli (London), Luca Lee Frei (Stockholm), Gidree Bawlee (Balia / Thakurgaon) and Bella Rune (Stockholm)

What would the idea of the origins of humanity look like if archaeologists had been able to study all the perishable materials that had long since dissolved and broken down? Perhaps the whole of history would have been rewritten and we would have talked about the thread age instead of the iron age, the weaving age instead of the bronze age.

In the exhibition Soft Logic, visitors are invited to a room to rethink what we “know” together with a group of artists who twist perspectives and explore logics other than the accepted. One of the artists speculates on the relationship between traditional patterns and modernist abstractions together with a group of women from Sidi El Mokhtar in Marrakech. Stretched along the floor of the art gallery, we encounter traces of Tensta’s millennial history from the Folkunga era to the Million dwelling program, depicted in carpet layers with cut-out patterns. Fabric with visible folds and traces of previous use testify to the value of textiles as part of a universal everyday gesture. Ceremonial textiles are used in all religions, but what could a ritual textile look like for a time with a need to express queer community?

This is something that is presented in brand new works by the participating artists. But Tensta konsthall also has its own textile tradition.

–For over ten years, the Women's Café at Tensta Konsthall has met twice a week to sew, knit, patch, socialize and talk. For us, it is clear what it says about the unifying power of textiles. Taking a closer look at the different ways that textiles put us in motion, in contact with each other and spur innovation through an exhibition is something that has been in the air for a while, says Cecilia Widenheim, director of Tensta Konsthall.

Bella Rune, who has long used textile methods and materials in her art as a fruitful reading of history and possible ways forward, emphasizes that it is not only the beautiful or valuable that is interesting. Textile culture can also be seen as a key to hidden knowledge, to memory banks and understanding of the human condition. Bella Rune is also responsible for the design of the exhibition, a playing field where history, technology and textile knowledge are in dialogue with the exhibited works.

–What is lost if we overlook the history of textiles as technology? For me, textiles are not an end in themselves, but a method to understand people, to see where we are going and to get in touch with our driving forces, says Bella Rune, co-curator and participating artist in the exhibition.In connection with the exhibition, all artists will activate parts of the exhibited works in different ways. Throughout the exhibition period, we invite you to the Platt som en pannkaka salon, where food, music and textile practice meet for an evening.

Photos: Jean-Baptiste Béranger.

The exhibitions is supported by Pro Suecia Foundation.

Chirps from extinct birds, waste on beaches that will never decompose and a wooden giant made from a pruned chestnut tree from Djurgården. These are some of the works that visitors will encounter in the exhibition Peace with Earth at Järva Gymnasium this spring.

Address: Hagstråket 11, entrance A4, Pilparken.

Participating artists: Ann Lislegaard, CATPC, Enno Hallek, Hira Nabi, Ingela Ihrman, Mats Adelman, Tom Bogaard, Aqui Thami and Ylva Westerlund.

The location is the so-called Glaskilen, a room surrounded by a winter garden with exotic plants, which was part of the architect Gösta Uddén's vision when he designed the school building next to the center of Tensta in the early 1980s. Based on the garden and the proximity to the Järvafältet cultural reserve, the exhibition approaches the burning questions about the connection between nature and economy, between exploitation and care and between environmental destruction and healing processes.

The title of the exhibition is borrowed from the book Peace with Earth, written in 1940 by the journalist and author Elin Wägner (1882–1949) and the landowner Elisabeth Tamm, a time when Europe had just been thrown into a world war. In the book Elin Wägner points out connection between the struggle for peace and sustainable agriculture, and her ideas have later become of great importance for the emergence of a broader environmental policy.

Peace with Earth is an exhibition put together by Tensta konsthall in dialogue with our new neighbors Järva Gymnasium, which opened its doors last fall in the beautiful but long-abandoned Campus Tensta neighborhood. The aim is partly to establish paths to joint projects such as book circles, hosting and exchanges in encounters with art together with the high school students and the art hall's various groups.

Secondly, the exhibition is part of an initiative from the property owner with the aim of creating a dynamic hub in Tensta for association life and activities for different ages.

The exhibition consists of sound installation, video, sculpture, painting, poetry and installation.

The exhibition is part of the Institution(ings) project co-funded by the European Union and running from 2024-2028. Institution(ing)s: Co-Creating Inclusive and Sustainable European Art Institutions is a project that encourages contemporary art and cultural organizations to collaborate on innovative institutional models that contribute to a sustainable future, social inclusion and artistic development. Composed of eight organizations of different types in seven European countries, the project represents the diversity within the cultural ecosystem. The project includes CAM – Centro de Arte Moderna Gulbenkian (PT), Tensta konsthall (SE), Universidade Católica Portuguesa (PT), tranzit.ro/ Iasi (RO), Errant Bodies/ The Listening Biennial (DE), Jan van Eyck Academi (NL), MOCA NGO (UA) and Museum of Impossible Forms (FI).

About Campus Tensta
Pilparken, just north of the center of Tensta, is a place that differs stylistically from the rest of the area. Here, in the early 1980s, one of the most elaborate high schools of the time, Tensta gymnasium, was built. At the same time, a sports center and a People's House with a large concert hall called Stockholmssalen were built. After having had very limited activity during a large part of the 2010s and 20s, the new owners, the community real estate company Hemsö, have the ambition that the block will once again become a place for the citizens of Tensta, one of the country's most densely populated areas, and a hub for education, community life, culture, innovation, entrepreneurship and sports with life and movement during a large part of the day. These activities are so far included in Campus Tensta: Järva Gymnasium, Tekniska museet, Tensta konsthall, Tensta Träff, Läsfrämjarinstitutet and Studiefrämjandet. 

Institution(ing)s is a medium-scale collaboration project co-funded by the European Union. Views and opinions expressed are however those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or the European Education and Culture Executive Agency (EACEA). Neither the European Union nor EACEA can be held responsible for them.