BORGARBÓKASAFNIÐ
Welcome to our interview series by J.J. Mancho: Chronicles from the Future! J.J. Mancho is a Reykjavik based artist who worked on documenting the Future Festival held in the Reykjavik City Library in March 2026. He conducted interviews with workshop hosts and project managers and is currently working on visuals too. Here is the first interview with artist Ingiríður Halldórsdóttir who hosted our plant pot making workshop.
HOPEFUL SEEDLINGS. MAKING PLANT POTS WITH INGIRÍÐUR HALLDÓRSDÓTTIR
A small group of people dig our hands in a thick paper paste. Ingirður Halldórsdóttir, the runner of this workshop, shares some thoughts while showing how to give a new life to discharged books. Known as Lyfvera, this multidisciplinary artist focuses on recycled materials, perception and health.
JJ: You are doing some flower pots.
Ingiriður: Yes, seedling pots out of recycled materials, paper, and a lot of other things. So I’ve been taking old library books and putting them in a blender, after using a shredder to make them into other new pages. We’ve also been doing seed paper. When you’re making the pages of paper you add in some seeds and then you can plant the page once you’re done using it.
But now we’re making pots so you can put the seeds and some soil and help them grow in the beginning and then instead of having to take them out from the plastic pot, you can just put them right away into the soil. Because the roots grow out of the books.
J: And it’s going to be a unique item.
I: Yes, and it’s a great way to give material a new way to matter and find a new path in the future. And I think it’s also beautiful because paper is made out of plants, trees and fibers from that. It’s a good feeling when you’re able to give it back to the earth, where it came from. And give the next plant season a safe vessel to grow in.
J: That is poetic.
I: Yes, I am also a poet so everything is a metaphor these days. I can’t really go anywhere without trying to write poetry, but it’s just that my brain, at the moment, is full of metaphors and similes and silly stuff as well.
J: So I guess you like to work with your hands?
I: Yes, I like molting. I do that also with my word play as well, like I molt languages or how people perceive things. I also do a lot of art with trash, a lot with my medication packaging. So I have friends that work in the same field or are also in the trash art scene, but I do it for sentimental reasons. So I try to connect it to a purpose that the material used to have or kind of honor it in a way. I am not going to be a hoarder in 30 years but I probably will. So that’s going to be hopefully with good trash and not just like kind of in a pile of paper somewhere in my 60s.
J: Hands are the primordial tool?
I: I feel more using just my hands. I run a print shop in Hafnar Haus, often it’s easier for me to tell the paper by touching with my fingers. Or even by sound rather than looking at it since it all looks very similar.
I also do ceramics and other kinds of sculpture. Due to the illnesses I’ve had over the last years, I’ve found a way to kind of practice and experience the world more with my hands than my eyes.
J: That allows you to be more present than being in front of a screen?
I: Yeah, it takes you out of it. I often listen to audiobooks or just thinking or getting more ideas but it’s nice to have your hands dirty so you literally can’t really be on your phone too much even though my phone cases have some clay on it most of the time or some paper trash.
More information:
Martyna Karolina Daniel
Project Manager of Equity and Community Engagement
martyna.karolina.daniel@reykjavik.is