She Is Thinking About the Flammable Nature of Things

She is Thinking About the Flammable Nature of Things is Laura Põld’s first solo show in Latvia, hosted by LOOK! Gallery. The exhibition features new installations and objects that Põld has constructed by mixing such materials as ceramics, steel, and textiles to investigate the nuanced layers of corporeality and vulnerability.

For many years, Laura Põld has been interested in the agency and expressiveness of materials and media. Her works intertwine organic and artificial materials, referencing the fragility of matter and drawing attention to different layers of temporality. Alongside materiality and craftsmanship, her approach embraces technical failures, welcoming the unpredictability of life with an ironic and contemplative commentary on the challenges of navigating existence.

In Põld’s earlier projects, craft, ecology, folklore and feminism would function as interconnected threads within a shared milieu. This exhibition, however, adds a dose of autobiographical sentiment through layers of materials gathered from the artist’s home. It also involves a desire to celebrate the reaching of middle age as a female artist by using bold colours, flowing fringes and the sharp clanging of metal.

There are darker verses within these celebratory songs, hinted at by the clumsily sawed metal plates, slightly melancholic tablecloths and certain titles of the individual artworks. The pitch-black wall sculpture series Misfits, for example, underlines the dark history of witch hunts executed towards women of certain age and knowledge. The installation series Adjunct to Her Bones Are Other Bones, Adjunct to Her Skin Are Other Skins reflects the inherent interconnection of all matter, a viewpoint that informs all of Põld’s practice. Then again one of the exhibition’s opening pieces – Enter the Darkest Room in My House (and Speak) – invites the art public to open mental spaces where life and art interlace. 

Laura Põld’s artworks present layers of material referencing places and contexts that have shaped her practice. In the new exhibition, viewers can encounter sculptural and craft-based forms and motifs, where one can sense the natural coexistence of absurdity and joy for experimentation. Communicated through eclectic techniques and the bold self-awareness of the forms, these immersive works become the thresholds for an artist entering a new decade. 

The exhibition is co-organised by Kogo Gallery and curated by Šelda Puķīte.

TEAM

Artist: Laura Põld
Curator: Šelda Puķīte
Production: Stella Mõttus, Raivis Alksnis
Communication: Karin Kahre, Anett Pettaig, Raivis Alksnis
Installation: LOOK! and Kogo Gallery
Photos: Kaspars Alksnis
Text: Laura Põld
Graphic design: Elizabete Punka
Translation and editing: Refiner Translations, Šelda Puķīte, Karin Kahre, Valts Miķelsons, Ilze Jansone

FUNDING

The exhibition is supported by the Ministry of Culture of Estonia from the fund Estonian Culture Abroad, Riga City Council, the Cultural Endowment of Estonia and the Culture Capital Foundation of Latvia