Artist on artist: Rina Eide Løvaasen on Kiki Smith

This is what Rina Eide Løvaasen says ahead of the special guided tour of “Kiki Smith – Woven Worlds”:

– As a conceptual artist, and after becoming acquainted with a, to me, new material –textile – I was invited to speak about Kiki. I take the liberty of calling her by her first name, just as I take the liberty in my work to approach things I have no prior knowledge of. Beyond this newly discovered shared materiality, I also see points of connection in the fact that we both build worlds.
– As I see it, we operate in parallel realities, where the common threads weave us together  –  if only briefly, consciously or not. During the guided tour, I will focus on both the elements that connect us and those that set us apart. I will try to share my reflections on exploring an artistic practice I was previously unaware of, but which I now see my own creative work is not independent from.

...the common threads weave us together – if only briefly, consciously or not.

A PERSONAL MYTHOLOGY

Rina Eide Løvaasen constructs non-hierarchical structures from elements that, through history, research, and folklore, have shaped how we understand ourselves today. She follows paths where existing descriptions are reused to describe new phenomena. Drawing from such phenomena as celestial bodies, mathematical structures, and geological formations, she gathers hints, doublings, and free associations in a transdisciplinary practice. Løvaasen builds upon these units to create a personal mythology, where fact is equated with fiction and emptiness – a mythology intended to guide a dialogue in which the void takes a leading role.

ABOUT RINA EIDE LØVAASEN

Rina Eide Løvaasen (b. 1988, Porsgrunn, NO) is based in Malmö. Her upcoming projects include public commissions for the municipalities of Porsgrunn (NO) and Uppsala (SE); Something Else (EG); and solo exhibitions at Bærum Kunsthall and Soft, Oslo (NO).

Selected exhibitions:

Kivik Art Centre (2025, SE); BABEL, Trondheim (2024, NO); Greenlight Triennial, Grenland (2024, NO). She is represented in the collections of the Public Art Agency Sweden and Region Gävleborg. Løvaasen has received several awards and grants, including a three-year working grant from the Billedkunstnernes Vederlagsfond (2025–27) and the Rettig Art Grant (2025). She is the founder of Malmö Open Studios.