Exhibition: 13-24 May at Konstfack
Jonathan Gard
Tales of a Magpie’s Nest
Left: Overview [wooden closet. Series of works inside/outside]. Right: 4x
Close-ups [gold, leather, bronze, silver, candy-wrappers, marble]
Jonathan Gard (He/him)
Sweden, b. 1995
jonathan_gard@outlook.com
+46 703406788
Dear J,
I’m honoured, excited and honestly a bit nervous to receive your invitation. I’ve watched you grow up and been waiting for this moment a long time, worried you’d never break your silence. I’m confident we all will listen, look and learn from these relics. This might be a revelation to some, but I believe most can relate to what you refer to as the magpie’s nest. Don’t worry, we are all hiding anyways and as Alok Vaid-Menon says, ‘Everybody’s closeted. Everyone plays pretend’.
Yours forever,
‘There is no becoming until you face the depth and darkness of your own soul. There is no becoming without healing and without a radical acceptance of one’s truth’.
– Viola Davis
“Piece of meat” [work placed outside of the closet: Welded and etched copper. Birth frame, photo (pigs in pigsty), baptism ribbon]
Left: “A Pandora’s box: Reconciliation” [wood, clothing patch, silver lockets, iron nails]. Right: Inequality [process, unpicking the embroidery]