Mechanical Weeds
The Flower, Jón Gunnar Árnason
This text was initially published as a chapter in the book The Wildflower (2020). Editors: Becky Forsythe, Penelope Smart, and Hómar Hólm. Published by Hafnarborg Art Museum.
The origins of The Flower can be traced back to 1967 when Jón Gunnar Árnason (1931-1989) laid out the foundation for a mechanical plant in his studio. The piece is a mechanic, kinetic sculpture that reaches its arms into the surrounding space, as Jón Gunnar remarked in an interview with Morgunblaðið in 1969: “Every year will see new shoots added to the machine, as perennial plants do, increasing its original weight by 100-200 kg.”¹ Originally the plant took roots in Jón Gunnar’s studio, growing before the eyes of regular visitors, as is described in a text by Einar Guðmundsson, who was a frequent guest in the sixties and remembers the development and production of the sculpture as a kind of performance.²
In effect, The Flower functions as a participatory artwork, thriving on the movements and presence of an audience, while constantly seeking balance.³ The viewer’s role and participation was of great importance to Jón Gunnar, who wished to engage the viewer actively in the interpretation – and by extension – the creation of the artwork.⁴ Participatory art is deeply rooted in the twentieth century, even if many only associate the movement with performance art and experimental contemporary art. In her book, Artificial Hells, Claire Bishop traces the origins of participatory art and relational aesthetics to a point in the twentieth century when Italian Futurism provoked audiences, Russian Constructivism exalted the communal and industrial and the Dadaists sought to bring art back to the people by placing artworks in public spaces. In participatory art, the viewer is no longer a neutral spectator but a participant and co-producer of the artwork.⁵ In this regard, The Flower displays strong influences of early twentieth century art history, worthy of consideration. The social impact of technological advancement and mass production are never far away and Jón Gunnar’s artworks are always inclusive of the audience and their role in the creative process. With his work and public stance as a political artist, he was generally considered provocative, thumbing his nose at abstract art, the dominant artform in Iceland at the time.⁶
Noise and Annihilation
Even though The Flower is rooted strongly in a certain time period, it has clear contemporary relevance. Jón Gunnar created this sculpture in tumultuous times: the sixties gave rise to technical, social and cultural changes that revolutionised the whole world. Humans landed on the moon and the world became one interconnected village, Americans waged war in Vietnam and the global fight for civil rights dominated the world stage. Like most of Jón Gunnar’s works, The Flower is an obvious reference to this era. Increasingly, technology’s presence in everyday life was becoming stronger, as machines and nature seemed to merge into one. Echoing this, Jón Gunnar spoke about “the abundant fakery involved with science and nature”, which he believed went against the natural order, as a result of warfare and advances in medical science.⁷
As time has passed, the strong relationship between technology and nature has become ever more apparent, even if the influence of technology upon us is yet to be fully revealed. Today, this fusion not only pertains to the means of transportation, allowing us to move with great velocity between different corners of the world, or triumphs in the field of medicine, but also to the way we have been transported into an alternate reality through social media. Our alternative selves, or lives, now exist in a different dimension that grows and expands with this ever-accelerating technical progress.
Consequently, Jón Gunnar’s sculpture finds a new life and context, in the present, as it continues to grow and expand into new spaces. In an unpublished memo that found its way into the exhibition catalogue Hugarorka og sólstafir, Jón Gunnar wrote that he wanted to draw people’s attention to “technology and the culture that thrives on its speed and noise”. His intention was not to put forth a conclusive argument, but creating works that might nudge or guide us towards a conclusion instead of being inherently conclusive.⁸
The tempo of the sculpture is at once fast and slow, being in a sense paradoxical. Whilst technology advances at great speed, the plant grows slowly. And nature’s erosive power, which humans cannot tame, exposes the metal plant’s weakness, The Flower likewise represents technology’s self-perpetuating growth, constantly moving forward, at the risk of losing all focus and direction, begging the question whether we should not stop and consider which way we are headed. Technology itself is a paradox: a harbinger of positive change, of progress, by harnessing the powers of the human imagination, despite its negative aspects, darker than we ever dared to believe.
In spite of its beautiful promise to elevate humanity to a higher plane of freedom, armed with ingenuity, we have now automatized oppression. It seems that technology, which ought to be rational and reliable by definition, has further consolidated and strengthened existing, dominant power relations. Facial recognition, for example, is coded with racial biases, so that people of colour are increasingly at risk of being wrongfully targeted, since machinery cannot adequately tell the difference between their faces. Human diversity is constantly under threat because of inherent prejudices in the fields of genetics and medicine, as it becomes progressively easier to manipulate genomes, thereby controlling individual characteristics and looks. The LGBTQ+ community has warned of the dangers embedded in the search for the genetic cause of homosexuality, out of fear that such knowledge might lead to the eradication of queer people, not a distant threat in a world where being gay is still illegal in some places. In addition, digital sexual violence has become even more horrific as artificial intelligence technology advances. Nation states and mega-corporations also rely on ruthless surveillance and harvesting data from citizens, in a continual cycle.
Jón Gunnar was acutely aware of technology’s dark sides, having been profoundly affected by the atom bomb, which he called “a scientific turn towards worldwide evil”,⁹ also referring to the horror of World War II. It is clear that few, if any, inventions have ever held such great promise and, at the same time, such destructive capabilities as nuclear power. However, Jón Gunnar also believed that technology could free us from manual labour, enabling humans to think, play and do whatever they want, since technology would effortlessly provide all necessities. “The future could be like this; I know it. But we are so insanely stupid and thoughtless that we are destroying this tiny ball we live on. [...] We are literally ruining the Earth through mechanisation.”¹⁰
The Weeds and the Looking Glass
The Flower is like the weeds that we turn a blind eye to in our back garden – the dandelions, which grow so bright and yellow, yet we still want them exterminated. The Flower attracts us in the same way, but it also unnerves us. It represents great promise, while revealing darkness underneath. We do not celebrate the weeds’ resilience, how it can withstand every wind and weather, instead, we despise it for taking up too much space, suffocating all else that grows in the soil.
Perhaps the participatory function of The Flower is not exactly the same now as it was back when Jón Gunnar created it in the sixties and seventies, but still it finds a new context in Hafnarborg. The Flower is a work of art that does not take itself too seriously or insist on being regarded as definitive. Jón Gunnar always trusted his audience to be active participants, interpreting art, and even though The Flower may have stopped growing in size, it continues to bloom ideologically, growing in the eyes of each new viewer, as well as new generations of museum and gallery visitors.
Refrences
Aðalsteinn Ingólfsson (1994). „Verk fyrir virkt fólk“. Í Hugarorka og sólstafir. Ritstj. Aðalsteinn Ingólfsson. Reykjavík: Listasafn Íslands.
Auður Ólafsdóttir (1994). „Ögrun á þrjá vegu: um viðhorf Jóns Gunnars Árnasonar til rýmisins“. Í Hugarorka og sólstafir. Ritstj. Aðalsteinn Ingólfsson. Reykjavík: Listasafn Íslands.
Bishop, Claire (2012). Artificial Hells: Participatory Art and the Politics of Spectatorship. London, New York: Verso.
Dagur Þorleifsson (14. maí 1970). „Afskiptaleysi er glæpur“. Vikan.
Einar Guðmundsson (1994). „Blómið og rætur þess“. Í Hugarorka og sólstafir. Ritstj. Aðalsteinn Ingólfsson. Reykjavík: Listasafn Íslands.
Hrafn Jökulsson (1987). „Vísindaleg þróun til djöfulskapar…“. Við í Reykjavík: Blað um borgina okkar, 1. tbl.
Óbirtur og ódagsettur texti úr skissukompu (1994). Birtur í „Um myndlistina, orkuna og umhverfið“. Í Hugarorka og sólstafir. Ritstj. Aðalsteinn Ingólfsson. Reykjavík: Listasafn Íslands.
Ólafur Gíslason (1994). „Ferðin að hliði sólarinnar“. Í Hugarorka og sólstafir. Ritstj. Aðalsteinn Ingólfsson. Reykjavík: Listasafn Íslands.
„SÚM sýningin“ (1. apríl 1969). Morgunblaðið.
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1 “SÚM sýningin” (1 April 1969): 20.
2 Einar Guðmundsson (1994): 55-61.
3 Ibid; Aðalsteinn Ingólfsson (1994): 28-41.
4 Undated, previously unpublished memo by the artist (1994): 75-80; Auður Ólafsdóttir (1994): 43-51.
5 Bishop (2012).
7 Ibid; Hrafn Jökulsson (1987).
8. Undated, previously Unpublished Memo by the Artist (1994): 75-80
9 Hrafn Jökulsson (1987).
10 Dagur Þorleifsson (14 May 1970): 26-27, 43-44.