Sanktmarie (Marie Bergqvist): “I come from the punk scene and often use music and text in works that are often expressed in performance and interactive installations. Since I went to HDK-Valand (fine arts) and Angereds Författarskola 2021, I have worked with the theme of being in the body for better or for worse, which for me means being close to the subordinate gaze listening to the world. In my work I try to do that by twisting and turning fairy tales and myths. I am interested in the magical and fantastic because its narrative is a kind of concentrate of power structures but also because of these narratives’ imaginative strategies of being body and language. Strategies that often turn upside down the western world’s hierarchical division between nature/man and that relate to separation, transformation and imagination. This separation is usually described as a kind of amnesia in which I reflect my own experiences. I don’t know what I forgot either – only that there is a separation.”
About the work: “I have to be creative all the time.” Polly asks “What does it mean to be flesh, to be devoured at the end of the tale?” Polly lives in a tent by the river, She has given birth to a daughter, Polly II, through her eyes and is therefore blind. She says that “right now” is a curse, it doesn’t allow her to remember. She can
therefore never be fully present because she is constantly reinventing herself. Polly is thus a tourist, (the tent), in the mythological landscape – life – where the river is the heart. The desire never ends and there is thus no clear line between pleasure and work. She can never fully surrender and rest. In a way, the story is a machine that starts and ends with the yellow fish and there could be any number of “Pollys” that come into existence through the mother’s eyes, live in desire, lose the eyes and a new Polly comes out to swallow it which came before. In ancient myths, separation and transformation often involve sexual violence and bloody murder. Here I have tried to explore more ways in which fairy tales emerge from distress where tenderness ultimately guides the action.
work in the exhibition
“Bedtime on the River” (2023)
- experimental video
- dimensions: (11,55 mins.)
- på svenska / English subtitles
- venue: Room 2012
exhibition.school 