Camilla Steinum’s exhibition at Kunsthal Thy explores the boundaries between the inner and outer body, their transitions, and how they are perceived. Large spheres hang from the ceiling and beams of the old barn, strung together on ropes that resemble pearl necklaces, while oversized ears on the walls hint at a bodily presence. Both elements are made from toilet paper mixed with wallpaper paste – a material that already suggests a connection between the everyday and the intimate.
Art exhibitions often aim to captivate the eye while keeping the viewers’ bodies at a distance, even disciplining them through prohibitions against touch. The artwork becomes an object of observation, and the viewer a seeing subject. A bodily reaction is only expected from the observing subject if the art object triggers an auratic resonance – right? Steinum’s work Between Uncertainties guides visitors’ movements in the exhibition space by structuring it. Yet, she breaks with the convention of distancing the art object from the viewer-subject:
The spheres and ears respond to the presence of visitors by lighting up – unpredictably, each with its own rhythm that reacts to movement and sound in the room. The coloration of the ropes recalls the changing hues of bruises during the healing process – from blue-green to yellow-green to brown-yellow. The shape of the spheres evokes associations with anal beads, objects that connect the inner body with its exterior. Disgust, shudder, or shame that such objects may provoke are not natural, but culturally learned reactions.
The choice of materials – toilet paper and wallpaper paste – points to a cultural and historical reflection on purity and impurity. In ancient Egypt, the Scarabaeus Sacer(Sacred Scarab), which lays its eggs in dung and forms balls from it, was considered a symbol of divine creation. The god Khepri, depicted with a scarab head, embodied the cyclical power of nature. Dung was not seen as impure, but as a life-giving element. In contrast, humorism in the Middle Ages drew a strict line between the inside and outside of the body. The 19th-century sanitary movement finally established feces as a cause of disease, further deepening the divide between “clean” and “unclean.” Steinum’s work challenges this dichotomy and invites viewers to question their cultural conditioning.
-Text by Marina Rüdiger
Camilla Steinum (b. 1986, Oslo) lives and works in Berlin and Oslo. She completedher Master’s degree in Art (2012) and her Bachelor’s degree in Textile (2009) at the Oslo National Academy of the Arts.
Her work has been featured in solo exhibitions at, among others, WIELS project space, Brussels (2023), Oppland Kunstsenter, Lillehammer (2021), Westfälischer Kunstverein, Münster (2020), Kunstverein Göttingen (2020), Soy Capitán, Berlin (2021, 2018, 2017), and Soft Galleri, Oslo (2015).
She has also participated in group exhibitions at venues including Hordaland Kunstsenter, Bergen (2019), Kunsthall Stavanger (2018), Norsk Skulpturbiennale (2017), Galerie Fiebach Minninger, Cologne (2016), and Munchmuseet, Oslo (2015).
