white dress

Laia Abril, Ala Kachuu (Bride Kidnapping), Kyrgyzstan, On Rape, 2022 © Laia Abril 2025 Courtesy the artist and Les filles du calvaire, Paris

Laia Abril meets Emily Jacir and Teresa Margolles

What Remains

6.9 2025 – 18.1 2026

Stockholm

Opens tomorrow

Resistance, commitment and political standpoint unite the artists in the exhibition “What Remains”. In their works, Laia Abril, Emily Jacir and Teresa Margolles draw attention to stories that expose injustice, abuses and raise questions about responsibility, understanding and the role of art in conversation and healing.

When Laia Abril suggested some artists that she was inspired by and wanted to meet in her exhibition at Moderna Museet, the choice fell on Emily Jacir and Teresa Margolles. Two artists who, like Laia Abril herself, work research-based with archives, photography, film and interviews.

In the exhibition “What Remains”, the works of the three artists now meet in a dialogue where resistance to various forms of oppression, social engagement and storytelling are the underlying themes.

shirt and trousers
Laia Abril, Military Rape, On Rape, 2022 © Laia Abril 2025 Courtesy the artist and Les filles du calvaire, Paris

On Rape, 2022

In her extensive project “A History of Misogyny”, Laia Abril explores the various beliefs, structures, and social systems that oppress women, focusing on topics such as abortion, mass hysteria, menstruation, and femicide. “What Remains” shows the second part of the project, “On Rape” (2022), where women’s testimonies of rape are reproduced through a series of conceptual photographs of clothing and objects connected to the abuse.

letter to a friend, Palestine, 2019

Emily Jacir’s film “letter to a friend, Palestine” from 2019 depicts the conflict between Palestine and Israel, a work that is still just as ferociously relevant today, six years after its creation. In the film, Emily Jacir tells in detail about her home in Bethlehem, Dar Jacir, and the street on which it is located. A place shaped by the constant threat of violence that both the city and its residents are forced to live with.

Plancha (Estocolmo), 2010/2025

For the exhibition at Moderna Museet, Teresa Margolles has created a new version of the work “Plancha”, originally from 2010. In the work “Plancha (Estocolmo)/Hotplate (Stockholm)” (2010/2025), the violence in Mexico is linked to the increasing spiral of violence in Sweden and the Stockholm region in recent years. Material has been collected from various murder scenes around the city and been mixed with water. The water drips from the ceiling onto heated hotplates, where it evaporates and creates a kind of memorial to the lives that were lost.

How can we relate to or understand the atrocities depicted? What do these stories evoke and what remains in us after encountering them? Art cannot resolve conflicts, but it can reveal and process collective experiences and thereby create space for conversation and healing.– Anna Tellgren, Curator.
Emily Jacir, letter to a friend, Palestine, 2019 © Emily Jacir 2025 Courtesy the artist
Emily Jacir, letter to a friend, Palestine, 2019 © Emily Jacir 2025 Courtesy the artist
Visitor information

Buy ticket

Regular: 150 SEK
Reduced price: 120 SEK
Annual Pass: 375 SEK

Free admission for those 18 and under and Klubb Moderna

Calendar events

  • Preview

Preview: What Remains

shirt and trousers
  • Conversation
  • In English

Artist Talk: Laia Abril