Iceland, drawn from the personal collection of 300 works bought by Pétur Arason and Ragna Róbertsdóttir since the 1970s, brings 20 works by world famous artists from the intimate Safn gallery in Reykjavik.
Iceland consists of work by 18 artists, including Lawrence Weiner, On Kawara, Reiner Ruthenbeck, Ragna Róbertsdóttir, Birgir Snæbjörn Birgisson, Hreinn Friõfinnsson and Safn's latest artist Tony Trehy, working in the minimalist, fluxus and conceptual genres on mixed media paintings, photography and sculpture.
The show recreates the intimate feel of Safn and the pieces were chosen to represent the unique landscape and culture of Iceland - and so its lava, its weather, its rocks and landscape, and its sense of 'strangeness' come in for analysis.
Volcanic
Carl Andre's grey basalt slabs and Richard Long's circle of volcanic rocks recreate the Icelandic landscape while Tacita Dean's collection of etchings - the Russian Ending - and Ólafur Eliasson's manipulated series of photographs present snapshots of the country's unique views.
German artist, Helmut Lemke, previously an arts research fellow at MMU and the University of Salford, will paint a piece in the gallery space based on a recent trip to Iceland during which he sat through a 37-hour storm.
Lemke's piece, which is titled 63º25'10"N/19º00'39"W, 13th and 14th of September 2006, is inspired by the noise of the storm, which raged around the south coast of Vik.
Iceland is on at Bury Art Gallery from Saturday, July 28 until Saturday, November 3. Free. Call 0161 253 5878 for more information.
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