Karin Forslund
"Expanding Matters"
For centuries, glass art has been defined by repetition and refinement of what exists within the known frameworks of craft tradition. The form is dictated by its maker, and its value is justified by the perceived skill and craftsmanship the maker demonstrates.
"Expanding Matters" focuses on the conventions that define a material and a craft. The exhibition presents the current stage of a ten-year artistic research project, initiated with the aim of examining contemporary consensus around the concepts of "craft" and "art." By stripping the material down to its raw form and examining its substance, and by removing the maker's hand from the creative process as far as possible, the project challenges how our expectations shape our perception of both skill and finished object.
First and foremost, questions are raised around the aspect of materiality – how do we relate to a material that is difficult to pin down? The works are made of glass – the same material as a drinking vessel; nothing is added that is not otherwise inherent to the object. Yet the works depart radically from what we associate with glass. The components of glass, at a chemical level, underpin the final material expression. By altering the proportions in the recipes, the properties of the glass are transformed and spontaneous movement emerges. This process raises the fundamental question: What defines a given material as glass?
Another aspect of the project is the visual expression and the interplay between artist and object. The core of the idea is simple: glass in a mould combined with heat. When the recipe is altered, however, a new process emerges, one that involves volatility and movement. As the maker, I put a request to the material: it is asked for a form – a response to the parameters that have been set. At high temperature and pressure, the material reacts with a will of its own; it moves and shifts, transforms and expands, and the final result can be neither controlled nor calculated. By working from this curiosity, which in turn drives progression, the components of the glass shed their constraining frameworks. The material thus breaks out and creates an entirely new form through its own autonomy.
About the artist
Karin Forslund (b. 1984) trained at Riksglasskolan, and took her Bachelor's degree at the Royal Danish Academy (KADK) in Bornholm. She holds her Master's degree in fine art from the Rhode Island School of Design.
Her artistic work springs from a deep interest in material and craft, and she raises both concrete and conceptual questions through her practice. Her work ranges from the ongoing project "Balancing Process," which takes glass chemistry as its starting point and investigates material definitions and concepts of craftsmanship and execution, to abstractions of words such as "transparency," "opacity" and "reflection." The series "Acts of transparency – On Negative Capability," which loosely translates to "On the ability to remain in uncertainty," is a collection of performance videos and spatial installations dealing with intimate experiences such as silence, invisibility and resistance. On fragility and strength.
Forslund is among the recipients of the Hetsch Bronze Medal for Crafts, and won 1st prize at European Glass Context 2016. She has taken part in numerous international exhibitions, including "Ung Svensk Form," "The Scandinavian Glass Project," "Young Glass," the group exhibition "RAW" – curated by Glenn Adamson at the Museum of Craft and Design in San Francisco, and the international exhibition "New Glass Now" at the Corning Museum of Glass in the USA, among others.
Karin lives and works in Haugesund.
Karin Forslund received Rogaland Kunstsenter's production grant from Bildende Kunstneres Hjelpefond 2022 with the project now on view at Rogaland Kunstsenter.