MFA Student Interview Series, part V: Kristyan Nicholson and Anton Kai

Kristyan Nicholson

When entering Kristyan Nicholson´s MFA exhibition TOMORROW HAS NEVER BEEN AS CLOSE AS IT IS RIGHT NOW, I was struck by how quiet the works were. There was an austere yet playful atmosphere, where I felt invited to investigate the potentiality myself, as Nicholson seemed to offer a series of wonderments to the viewer, through both sculpture and video using materials such as the sun, a webcam and Fleetwood Mac´s Albatross.

What has the process of creating your MFA show been like?
It’s been confrontational, challenging, and led me deep into the very essence of what I set out to explore within my artistic practice. I couldn’t be more grateful.

What has been your inspiration?
Paying full attention to the world as systems, and the practice of remaining grateful for the (extra)ordinary.

What has been your thinking / approach as how let the viewer into the work? Here I am wondering about the presentation of the work, where I feel you leave the interpretation very open.

The interpretation of the work is left very open, just like any moment outside of a gallery or art setting would be.

My intentions are to set a field of parameters from which the works develop on their own, and as a result, develop and autonomy of their own. These parameters are set equally as much for the viewer, for which the possibility to become aware of the ebbs and flows of our immediate realities are set to develop. It all requires participation.

This leads me to final question, which has to do with language. How do you sculpt your thinking around playing with language(s) and notions of it?
Poetry and phenomenological perspectives have had some of the strongest influence on my ways of reading the world. Much like the use of a koān by a Zen Buddhist, my artistic language manifests circumstances that reflect upon the inefficiency of logical reasoning and provide me the opportunity to formulate a framework for becoming aware of situations that exceed a verbal or written language.

Kristyan Nicholson's exhibition was displayed at Malmö Art Gallery (KHM1) April 12th - April 27th 2024.

Interview by Karin Hald.

Anton Kai

When entering the gallery of Malmö Art Academy to see the MFA exhibition entitled Another Nature by Anton Kai, I was met by numerous photographs, in black and white, hanging in a line straighter than straight throughout the space. The sequence was curated with great precision, each photograph showing either the artist himself or something close to heart and mind.

How has the process of creating this exhibition been?
It's quite fantastic to get the opportunity to make such a big show and make a solo exhibition. The whole framework behind it - working through all the practicalities, making all the works. I have been working on it for one and half years. Almost since I started the MFA. It's fun and exciting.

The subject matter and the motor of the show, psychoanalysis, did you already know you wanted to work with that from the beginning of the process?
I’m not sure it was a conscious choice I made at any point. I think and work at a quite slow pace. In a way the works presented at my MFA show is a continuation of the works from my BFA exhibition. Back then I wasn’t aware of what was in play in the same way as I am now. I have used a lot of time searching for literature or theory that could help me understand what I’m doing. At some point it just felt right to use psychoanalysis not just a framework to understand the work but also as a working method when doing the works.

How do you move between theory and using yourself and/or materials in your work?
Using myself and photography as a method is connected to all the theories that I have been taught and that I have been reading myself. I experience the theory through using it on myself. I get to know myself by using the theory. It's like a circle, they are dependent on each other. The same goes for the medium. I think the strongest way to experience photography is to do it yourself and to point the camera inwards.

What has your inspiration been?
My theoretical inspiration has been these (to me) canonical text on photography by Roland Barthes, Hervé Guibert and Walter Benjamin. That and psychoanalysis. The camera and the optical has been used to explain how the psyche is working in psychoanalytical texts throughout history. It is an attempt to combine these different modes of thinking and then use photography as a practical method of psychoanalysis.

In a practical sense, I have made self-portraits to express how I experience the world or my dreams, my nightmares. What both hope and anxiety feel like to me. I use photography to express myself instead of talking on the couch with a therapist.

When I read the hand-out which was presented as part of the show, I read it as a poem about the work that came about, your thinking as you made it and I read that you leave room for doubting yourself and the process. How do you view doubt in relation to your art making?
I think doubting myself and my work is always with me, but maybe it's something which has to do with being an artist. But it's also a way to secure that you are being open to the work. When you are not sure then there are still many opportunities as to how the work can change and evolve. Being hesitant or doubting your own ideas gives room for a much more fruitful conversation than certainty does.

Anton Kai's exhibition was displayed at Malmö Art Gallery (KHM2) April 12th - April 27th 2024.

Interview by Karin Hald.