Legacy – Catalogue
2019

This exhibition builds on my book of the same name about Ámundi Jónsson and his legacy. Here in the vestibule of the building that is now to many the central church of Iceland I have merely attempted to evoke the feeling left behind in my mind by my journey through this project. Here I am not relating the complicated story; that is the job of the book. My approach in the paintings is rather a brief simplification of the causes and effects that I see in the story and the purpose of the messages that religion has exploited through symbolism and metaphor over the years. To me this all appears incredibly easy to understand and I am amazed at how matters have become tangled and locked up with mystical keys that no one any longer understands. By simplifying and bringing the objects closer to us I am seeking to conjure up a mirror of our own life, while simultaneously clarifying the symbolism by which religions communicate.

About the exhibition and its background:

In the minds of most Icelanders the eighteenth century was a faraway and dangerous time, a time of spectacular natural disasters in the south of the country and their terrible aftermath, but also of significant regeneration and occasion to look into how people lived, what their houses were like, above ground and beneath.  In recent years there has been a major reawakening of interest in the eighteenth century but many questions remain unanswered.  One of these concerns the art that was being produced in the country.

It has been a privilege to have been able to follow the research work done by Guðrún A. Tryggvadóttir and Arndís S. Árnadóttir on the life of Ámundi Jónsson (1738-1805).  As a young man, Ámundi was employed in the workshops of the Innréttingar, the first concerted effort to introduce new industries and working practices into Iceland. Later he sailed to Copenhagen and spent three years there as an assistant in the Rundetårn observatory, where he perfected the craftsmanship that laid the basis for his later life’s work; this included, apart from anything else, building probably thirteen churches during the course of his life.  He also achieved great skill in wood carving, in the late Baroque so-called acanthus style, evident in his church furnishings like the altarpieces and baptismal fonts found in various churches in southern Iceland and in the National Museum.

Guðrún’s works in this exhibition seek their inspiration in Ámundi’s life and creations. Guðrún began her search into his history just over two years ago, initially out of simple curiosity about the art of former centuries but with increasing enthusiasm for what her investigations brought to light.

The watercolours that now grace her book of the same name, Lífsverk – Þrettán kirkjur Ámunda Jónssonar (Legacy – The thirteen churches of Ámundi Jónsson), were originally intended just as a little exhibition catalogue with a few pictures and a short text, but turned into a whole book embracing her research into Ámundi Jónsson in words and pictures.

Recent research has shown that child mortality in Iceland at this time was greater than anywhere else in Europe and left a deep mark of suffering on the soul of the nation. Of the nineteen children of Ámundi’s parents, Jón Gunnlaugsson and Þuríður Ólafsdóttir, thirteen died young.  Ámundi and his wife Sigríður lost two of their eight children. These conditions touch Guðrún deeply and she has attempted to get closer to the feelings that the family under Eyjafjöll may have lived with and so found a resonance in the symbolism of religion. Thirteen infants in swaddling clothes, the dead children, lie in the mountainside by the farm, while on the opposite wall we see them having turned into angels, sparking a ray of hope of eternal life in heaven. Thirteen churches, Ámundi’s great achievement, are recorded on the panels of the story and kindle in us the admiration and respect that he so utterly deserves.

Guðrún’s works here on display in Hallgrímskirkja project a firm conclusion from her research. The focus is on the coherence in the life of a working family in rural Iceland and the imagery that religion uses to get its messages across – messages that crystallise in birth, hope and sacrifice. Questions are raised about time and the ultimate course of our lives in boundless space and an attempt is made to convey the meaning of human endeavours through form.

Works on display:

1. Thirteen swaddling bands.
Oil on linen.
170 x 120 cm.

2. The family of Jón Gunnlaugsson and Þuríður Ólafsdóttir at Steinar under Eyjafjöll, 1740, with little Ámundi in his mother’s arms.
Oil on linen.
170 x 150 cm.

3. Life course, orbit around the sun.
Oil on linen.
170 x 150 cm.

4. Thirteen-sided form.
Oil on linen.
170 x 150 cm.

5. Thirteen churches.
Oil on linen.
170 x 150 cm.

6. Thirteen angels.
Oil on linen.
170 x 120 cm.

About the Artist:

Guðrún Arndís Tryggvadóttir was born in Reykjavík in 1958. She studied at the Icelandic College of Arts and Crafts, 1974-8, l’École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts in París, 1978-9, and the Munich Academy of Fine Arts, 1979-83, where she won the prestigious graduates’ prize of the Free State of Bavaria, Bayerischer Debütanten Förderpreis für Künstler u. Publizisten. Guðrún has exhibited here in Iceland, in Europe and the USA, and received numerous awards both for her artistic work and for her pioneering efforts in a range of areas of innovation. She founded and directed the art college RÝMI and headed the artistic design studio Kunst & Werbung / Art & Advertising in Germany and then in Iceland for several years. Guðrún also set up and ran the environmental website Nature.is for around ten years and has spearheaded educational initiatives in environmental issues in Iceland since returning to the country in 2000. In 2012 the website received Kuðungurinn award of the Ministry for the Environment and Natural Resources for its contribution to environmental affairs. Guðrún’s principal medium is oil on canvas and her large paintings draw on a strong ideological and often historical foundation. Her work appears in public collections here in Iceland and abroad.