Artist Statement

Jóa is interested in celestial and cellular bodies. Jóa likes plastic. Jóa actually has mixed feelings about plastic. Jóa is attracted to it, likes the squishy feel and bright colors, even the smell. Plastic plants don’t die. Neither can viruses. Technically. Jóa likes to collect things that strike her fancy. Jóa also wants to be a conscientious consumer. Jóa knows that her things control her. When she is trying to focus, she’ll listen to the same 11-hour recording of the ocean on youtube. Jóa tries to meditate sometimes. She’ll sit in an outdoor space. And self-consciously try to connect with herself and her surroundings. She imagines her consciousness as a cloud or a bubble that extends approx 78 cm out from her skull. Like an atmosphere or a cell’s outer membrane, some things can pass through and others not. This semi-permeability is present in her work as glass, plastic or water. Her work tries to negotiate conflicted relationships within herself, or with and between natural nature and man-made nature.

Bio

Jóhanna Ásgeirsdóttir or Jóa is an Icelandic-American visual artist who splits her time between New York and Reykjavik. During her time at NYU she has explored various media including painting, installation and performance. Her work is inspired by and deals with intersections between art and science, natural and artificial spaces, intertwined with personal narratives and emotions. Her artwork has been exhibited in group shows in New York, Reykjavik and Berlin. In 2016 she participated in a residency program in Kópavogur, Iceland, through and during which she was commissioned to complete a public mural for Kópavogur Elementary School. The piece is part of an ongoing project to build educational material that bridges math, science and art. She has also been involved in various costume and set design projects in film, theatre and gallery spaces. Her most recent project in design is the set design for a staging of the opera Orlando by Cantanti Projects at The National Opera Center in New York, in February of 2017.

Jóa’s work was featured in “Systems Flow,” curated by Julia Bozer.

Selected Works