Berg­lind Jóna Hlyns­dóttir: Class Divider

Berglind Jóna has worked as a visual artist in Iceland, Sweden and Brazil. She has worked on extensive projects in the public space and participated in many international group exhibitions and collaborations. This is her first solo exhibition in a public museum. Berglind deals with various themes, which often involve questions regarding public spaces. In an urban society, where the surroundings are man-made and each thing is designed for a specific purpose, Berglind explores the environment, based on the history and expectations that society holds towards those things.

In Class Divider, Berglind deals with a certain phenomenon, designed to separate passengers during air travel. Class Divider raises questions about how we create systems and tools to divide people by social standing in different places. 

Among recent shows that Berglind Jóna has participated in is the exhibition series Double Bind which was curated by the Rupert Center for Art and Education in Lithuania (2015) shown in three cities in Lithuania and then both in Norway and Iceland (2016), The public space work Inner Workings (The Walk Work): Memoirs of the clock at Lækjartorg Plaza, shown in the Reykjavík City Center, Iceland (2014). Among international exhibitions Berglind has participated in are The 4th International Sinope Biennale - Wisdom of Shadow: Art in the Era of Corrupt Information Turkey (2012). LET ME THINK! curated by Laura Mott, 3rd Moscow Biennale at Red October, Moscow (2009). Berglind was chosen to compete for the Hasselblad award: Victor Stipendium and took part in two shows organized by Hasselblad: New Nordic Photography at the Hasselblad Center in Gothenburg and the Center For Photography in Stockholm (2010). 

Exhibitions in Gallery D at Hafnarhús focus primarily on artists who have not previously held one-person shows in Iceland’s major galleries. The objective of the exhibition series is to offer promising artists the chance to work on their own terms in a public gallery, and to draw the attention of museum visitors to new and interesting developments in the art world. 

Five exhibitions are planned for 2016 in the Gallery D series. Artists Saemundur Thor Helgason, Berglind Jóna Hlynsdóttir, Arnfinnur Amazeen, Örn Alexander Ámundason and Ingibjörg Sigurjónsdóttir will show their work..