Emma Hasselblad & Ellen Dynebrink

Images Knocking on Your Door

9 March - 30 April 2023

Throughout 2023, curator Kari Skippervold presents the exhibition series Images Knocking on Your Door in Format’s project room. The series consists of six open-call-based exhibitions featuring seven artists.

At the core of both Emma Hasselblad’s and Ellen Dynebrink’s work is a devotion to the textile material and an ongoing dialogue with the values and limitations that come with the textile field. They both work with techniques, patchwork and knitting, where method and process is largely determined by the textile material and which for both artists require strategies to overcome the contradictions found in the role of the female artist and in the textile traditions. Inspired by the ancient myth of Nemesis, Dynebrink and Hasselblad identify two recurring phenomena in their working processes – hubris and self-loathing. In Greek mythology the goddess Nemesis is the one who rules over revenge and retribution and the one who punished the humans when they showed hubris and arrogance towards the gods. But looking beyond the ethical message, the story of Nemesis can also become a source of power. By allowing oneself to acknowledge both the hubris and self-loathing of the creative process, the myth becomes a tool for confronting the contradictions inherent in the role of the female artist and a strategy for appropriating traditional techniques and forms.
Emma Hasselblad (b.1991) is a textile artist whose artistic practice evolves around hand knitting as the main technique. She explores knitting in relation to body, architecture, history and knitting traditions. She explores the possibilities inherent in knitting: the flexible, stretchy material that the knitted fabric allows.
Emma received her MFA in textile art from the University of Gothenburg (HDK-Valand) in 2019 and a BFA from ESMOD Berlin, Germany in 2015. Her work has been exhibited in galleries, museums and fashion venues internationally; Konstakademien (Stockholm), Textilmuseet (Borås), Fashion Clash Festival (Maastricht). She has been an artist in residency at Textile Arts Center, New York and she received Västra Götalands culture grant 2020. Emma lives and works in Stockholm, Sweden.
 
Ellen Dynebrink (b.1986) is a textile artist based in Gothenburg. Ellens works mainly with patchwork, combined with the love for the textile material and the relationship between the textile field and women’s history. Her main technique is based on photos and sketches that are converted into patchwork with added distortions, where the process and execution revolve around an examination of values in feminine coded expressions. In previous artworks she has investigated the relationship between the ”gaze” and the ”image” with following questions about subjectivity and objectivity.  Ellen Dynebrink received her MFA in textile art from the University of Gothenburg (HDK–Valand) in 2017 and a BFA in Textile Design from The Swedish School of Textiles in 2014. Her work has been exhibited in galleries and museums both nationally and internationally; Charlottenborg Kunsthall (Copenhagen), 3e våningen / GIBCA Extended (Gothenburg),  Gustavsberg Konsthall (Värmdö), Nina Sagt Gallery (Düsseldorf) In 2021– 2022 she participated in IASPIS residency program in Stockholm for 6 months at The Swedish Art Grants Committee. 
 
The exhibition is supported by The Swedish Arts Grants Committee.