Interview by Margrét Blöndal. On the occasion of the exhibition “Inside a conch shell, one dot.” In Gallery Kling&Bang Reykjavík 2005

Ráðhildur. Has the conch shell revolved? Have we entered into another pixel?

I don’t think so. The conch shell is like the universe. We experience different kinds of reality depending on where we are placed in it. The same with the dot it has many layers where different events are happening.

On the first floor is a peculiar mixture of void and mass. Could you tell us something about these two components? Is it necessary that the mass is wax? Could it be something else?

Mass and void are the same thing. Neither could exist without the other. Mass is just another form of void. And void is another form of mass. This installation is a representation of an environment from a dream. It is important that wax has the quality of changing easily into the other part of the mass i.e. the void. It is somewhere between liquid and solid, it melts and burns easily.

On the one hand you seem to have the tendency to dissolve limited spaces like the spaces that you work with and on the other hand you are making small limited worlds with your video work. Tell us something about these two components, that is about reduction and expansion.

When I dissolve the space by painting it as I did in The Living Art Museum last autumn or make a wax installation like I am experimenting with now, I perceive myself in a different place in reality. This is like getting through to another layer of the dot; As though my reality is experienced from another place. Somewhat like when people get my letters about the loop movement of the planets. The letters draw peoples attention to outer-space. Those who receive the letters are suddenly transported to another place in reality. I am not making a circumscribed world with my video. I am dealing with the same reality as in the dissolved space, but from another point of view which requires another medium.

What significance has it for your exhibition that it extends into different rooms?

I think it enhances the feeling for the complexity of reality

Dreams are something you can store in a safe corner of your mind. They often signify veiled messages of a person’s inner life. Is it your subconscious that we are invited to attend?

I don’t know. The dreams just exist. I retell them as I remember them, make use of the feeling they leave behind. I do not interpret my dreams. I simply experience them. They are a part of my existence. They have played an important role in my choice of subject-matter (theme) in art through the years that is why I am examining them closely.

How do you pick the dreams that you exhibit, have they been censored?

It is not so long ago since I started working with my dreams in the way that I am doing now. I had to practice new methods of working so that some of the dreams presented here are selected according to whether they are easy or difficult to perform. Apart from that, I choose the dreams depending on how strongly they live with me into the day.

Is the conch shell in constant motion?

Everything is in constant motion.