The Wall

Petra Lindholm, b.1973 in Karis (Karjaa) in Finland, educated at the Royal Institute of Art in Stockholm (1996 – 2001), lives and works in Småland in Sweden. She is a Finnish-Swedish cinematographer continuously exploring and extending her range of tech- niques and media like video, sound, photography, drawing and textile collage. Lindholm has been regularly participating in individual and group exhibitions in Sweden, Europe, North America and Asia. Her works are represented in numerous public art collections, among others, Kiasma in Helsinki, Moderna Museet in Stockholm, Mal- mö Konstmuseum, Borås Konstmuseum, ProArtibus Foundation in Finland, and many private collections worldwide. In addition to various national and international prizes and scholarships, 2006 Petra Lindholm was honored with the 3rd prize of the prestigious Carnegie Art Award – one of the world’s largest art awards at that time (Carnegie Prize 1998 – 2014). 2018 Petra Lindholm was honored with the prestigious Axel Theofron Sandbergs akvarellpris. The project „Heat Wave“ (#2) by Finnish-Swedish artist Petra Lindholm contains an outstanding overview of Lindholm’s latest interpretations of rocks and meteorites. After the first edition of the project in cooperation with The Municipal Gallery bwa in Bydgoszcz (2017) we are proud to present the second volume of the project containing Lindholm‘s latest fabric collages and assemblages. In Lindholm’s latest works fabric has become a new way to express and visualize different scenes from her moving images – by using multi-layered translucent fabrics. This special layer-to-layer technique developed in the first place in Lindholm’s videos gives a distance and a dreamlike feeling to Lindholm’s work and enables the coexistence of personal and global references and various time horizons: “I research visual memories, thinking patterns, routines, fantasies, dreams, visualisations, hypnosis, repetitive patterns, layer-to-layer-to-layer, how our thoughts and inner monologues are build up, changing all the time, nothing is permanent...” (Petra Lindholm) Massive rocky landscapes recur in Lindholm’s work, inspired by a longer stay in Kathmandu in Nepal a few years ago. In her video work “Empty Vessels” (2014), developed during the stay, we follow the footsteps and thoughts of people participating in the expeditions climbing the high peaks of the Himalayas. Throughout history, mountains have symbolized constancy, eternity, firmness and stillness. On the spiritual level, mountains symbolize aspiration and renunciation of worldly desires. The mountain here can be seen as a symbol of a general desire that exists in our society today. The dream of reaching the top, being happy for a while when the goal is reached, and then getting on to even greater heights. Current phenomena that interest the artist are how larger areas of ice, ice mountains floating freely in open water, and permafrost now melt and how traces of past life appear. Perhaps the traces of our own civilization will not be more than an abnormal discoloration in the bedrock about 50,000 years from now. Lindholm‘s current works are abstracted reflections on space and our environment with its geological ages and life cycles.