Vestur í bláinn | Music Project & Art Exhibition
Vestur í bláinn aims to be a space for voices, different languages and stories of people from diverse origins. It is a multidisciplinary music and art project on immigration in Iceland.
At the Reykjavik City Library in Gerðuberg Ewa Marcinek exhibits her art piece Second skin next to the music piece Anna by Julius Pollux.
We ensure at all times to follow the latest rules regarding social distancing and gathering restrictions. Click here for further information.
The exhibition is open during the opening hours of the library.
Entry is free and everyone is welcome.
Visitors can listen to the sound piece by scanning an QR code. Visitors can also use their own headphones or an audio cable from the player at the location.
About the music piece Anna
by Julius Pollux
Anna is a labour organiser and care worker who moved to Iceland after finishing her master’s degree in Kraków.
Living in Reykjavík, she worked within various occupations as a housekeeper, cleaner, waitress and teacher in an after-school programme.
The recordings in this song are from a phone conversation that Anna had with her friend back in Poland. In addition, we hear excerpts from Anna’s speech during a protest march at the general strike in Reykjavík in the spring of 2019. She held her speech both in English and Polish, advocating for low-income workers and the migrant workforce. People of Polish origin constitute 5% of Iceland’s population and are the largest immigrant group.
About the art piece Second skin
by Ewa Marcinek
A whole body suit made from yellow rubber gloves stitched together using medical suture protects your delicate human composition from any harsh, harmful or simply unpleasant reality in a new country. Inspired by Wiola Ujazdowska’s explorations of the universe of female migrant workers in Iceland.
About the project Vestur í bláinn
Julius Pollux started Vestur í bláinn as an experimental music project, which combines voices of immigrants and refugees in Iceland with his own musical take on the subject.
Claire Paugam and Julius Pollux then teamed up to expand the project into an art exhibition and elevate political concerns within a poetic perspective, encouraging a humanistic and empathetic look on people’s stories, situations, emotions and backgrounds.
Local artists were invited to engage in a dialogue with the music pieces by creating the ten artworks that are presented in this exhibition.
The exhibition takes place in ten public locations in Reykjavík from September 3rd to September 30th 2020.
Further information on the exhibition program :
Website of Vestur í bláinn
The curators give further information about the project:
Claire Paugam: clapaugam@hotmail.fr
Julius Pollux Rothlaender: juliuspollux.net@gmail.com