The artist duo and recipients of the Icelandic Art Prize 2021, Libia Castro & Ólafur Ólafsson, will give an artist talk Saturday May 22nd at 1 p.m. There, they will talk about their exhibition Magic Meeting – A Decade On. This exhibition is the latest step in their socially engaged and interventionist art practice, continuing their investigation into the merging of art and activism and experimenting with the magic of art and its potential agency as a tool for social transformation.
The exhibition’s subject is the constitution that was written in response to the Icelandic public‘s demand for a moral inventory following the financial crisis in 2008, but the project gained international attention for its innovative and democratic approach. On October 20th 2012, the people of the country voted in agreement of the new constitution in a national referendum. As of today, however, the new constitution has not been ratified by the Icelandic Parliament.
Libia Castro & Ólafur Ólafsson have been in collaboration since 1997 and their work has been exhibited nationally and internationally on many occasions, including the 8th Havana Biennial, Van Abbe Museum, Manifesta 7, the 54th Venice Biennial, CAAC Seville, Kunst-Werke Berlin, 19th Sydney Biennial, Norway´s National Gallery and La Casa Invisible. They work in Reykjavík, Berlin, Rotterdam and Málaga.