Apolonija Sustersic, Moderna Museet Project in Prästgården, 1999 © Apolonija Sustersic
MMP: Apolonija Sustersic
4.2 1999 – 14.3 1999
Stockholm
The lack of light in the North during winter months is not only felt by visitors from more southerly latitudes, but also by people living in the North. Light therapy has increasingly become a common form of treatment for SAD (Seasonal Affective Disorder), otherwise known as winter depression. Light therapy may nowadays be found in both hospitals and shopping centres. When Apolonija Sustersic chose to place her light therapy under the auspices of Moderna Museet it also becomes a comment on museum´s activities in general, namely that their ancilliary activities – including restaurants and shops – are today at least as important as their collections and exhibitions. Her project comments on the status and function of Moderna Museet´s new building and refers to current discussions about what is needed to provide the best environment for art.
After attending the School of Architecture at Ljubljana University, Apolonija Sustersic spent two years at the Rijksakademie in Amsterdam. She is interested in the encounter between people and different kinds of space; in the physical, psychological, social and political implications of places. Of particular interest to her are women´s experiences of both male architects deliberately masculine products and the buildings of patriarchal culture. Sustersic´s post-minimalist architectonic interventions, where sound, light and the buildings of movement are important elements, may take the form of installations or videos. In “MTV for La Tourette” she has filmed her own wanderings through Corbusier´s monastery – all the way into the ladies toilets. The video also includes sequences where a composer “plays” on the monastery windows, which were originally designed by the – in the context marginalised – architect/composer, Iannis Xenakis.
For the exhibition Manifesta 2 in Luxemburg in the summer of 1998, Apolonija Sustersic created a work aimed at the neighbours of the exhibition venue. Those living nearby who lacked local cafés and bars could visit her orange-painted juice bar, quench their thirst with fresh orange juice and watch videos about life in the neighbourhood and about how a dancer “measured off” the exhibition space before the art moved in.
Soon after the opening of a new Moderna Museet Projekt a documentary catalogue will be published.
Curator: Maria Lind
Moderna Museet Project
Moderna Museet Project is an activity of the Moderna Museet in Stockholm. Artists are commissioned to make new work for the temporary project space in the Old Vicarage next to the museum on Skeppsholmen, for other situations and environments in the city of Stockholm or elsewhere.
