Museum Display

Solo installation at Frieze London
Represented by Temnikova & Kasela Gallery
3–6 October 2019

At Frieze Focus 2019, Temnikova & Kasela Gallery showed my new solo installation, Museum Display, which explores the national museum as a tool for establishing official versions of authenticity. In museum displays everyday objects and detached pieces of history become canonical documents; the many possible layers of meaning are fixed in an official arrangement, presenting an amorphous phenomenon as a defined and authentic event.

The installation explores some of the subjects that are often framed by norms, customs, ideals and the inevitability of their cultural context. Soviet textiles provide a backdrop for works composed of traditional Estonian items of clothing such as belts, mittens and socks. Pieces of classical sculptures, once hidden away, are now put on full view. Historic documentation of museum collections are juxtaposed with starlit skies. What is the role of chance, censorship, politics and trends in the formation of the hierarchy of history?

Photos by Lewis Ronald