The Pluvialis Apricaria prefers to spend winter in the British Isles or in Southern Europe. But in spring the bird comes to Iceland, becoming a symbol of hope and new beginning. Its arrival is celebrated every year in Iceland’s press: “Lóan er komin” / “The Golden Plover Has Arrived”, a headline that alludes to a romantic poem. A dark, cold period will pass, for the bearer of imminent fortune has appeared.

“Lóan er komin” / “The Golden Plover Has Arrived” is also the title chosen by Steingrimur Eyfjörd for his complex exhibition project marking the 52nd Biennale di Venezia; he is fully aware that the Icelanders’ connotations are different to those of people from elsewhere who are unlikely to be familiar with this bird’s significance as a bearer of spring. The historical course of every culture’s mentality has probably created symbols of this kind – an intriguing blend of science (ornithology in this case), spirituality and tradition – nonetheless the arrival of the European Golden Plover is an event that is celebrated in Iceland, making it part of the great puzzle of national identity. The analysis of local cultural identity in the face of worldwide influences and the merging of one’s own consciousness with physical reality are core themes in Eyfjörd’s art. The creation of cultural myths within a rapidly expanding society takes place here just as much as in other countries and cultures.

The fourteen individual projects in Eyfjörd’s multifaceted exhibition all work on various semiotic levels using texts, photography, drawings and objects. They are based mainly on interviews, each a pars pro toto unto itself, a specimen of Icelandic culture. Yet Eyfjörd is no storyteller; he is a concept artist. Word, illustration, narration and message content are for him a means in the artistic creation process. When he has elves’ shoes made to fit the exact specifications of eyewitness accounts or when he obtains an invisible sheep from a “hidden person” (the huldufólk is a distinct Icelandic myth), he is primarily dissecting single elements of cultural politics. This transfer becomes particularly clear in ‘net cutter’, which comes across rather like a Duchampesque Ready-Made quotation. It is about an effective weapon used by the Icelandic Coast Guard in the cod-fishing wars of the 1970s; Iceland defended its fishing zone against British fishing boats by cutting open their trawl nets. However, the Togvíraklippur’s transfer as an object of utility into the museum sphere took place as early as 1986 (since then one of these weapons has been on display at the National Museum of Reykjavik). Consequently, Eyfjörd’s transfer is directed not so much at the object itself but rather at society’s treatment of it as an element of Icelanders’ cultural memory. Eyfjörd connects the theme to the present by choosing aluminium as the material for the replica, i.e. the very material whose processing is responsible for the creation of entire industries in Iceland and all the pros and cons that come with them. The individual objects such as the net cutter, the European Golden Plover or the elf all represent cultural myths, each laden in cultural history, which Eyfjörd connects using associative networks and which constantly push open new doors of convergence and interpretation within the overall context of the exhibition – reciprocally and full of significance – in order to fathom their meaning within present-day Icelandic consciousness.

Eyfjörd’s collecting, emphasising and conserving of elements of Icelandic history and the constant questioning of one’s own cultural identity is of crucial relevance in defining cultural consciousness in an age of globalisation. Alongside literature and music the fine arts have the strongest voice in this respect. The entire context in which Eyfjörd’s exhibition is embedded is to be viewed according to this (self) analytical approach. The Biennale di Venezia stands rather like a 19th century bulwark, defying the principle of the art market and of global assimilation with the concept of national and state art presentation. Rather like an experiment the countries’ pavilions create the direct confrontation of a specific national and cultural position put concisely in the eyes of others. It is this view from outside, however, that is frequently laden with stereotypes that at best emphasise – and at worst divert one’s attention away from – the essential; in any case they reduce the object to be viewed to a cliché. There is hardly a country that is associated with stereotypes to the extent of Iceland. Iceland struggles to free itself of them while benefiting from them, allowing them to lend it the aura of wild nature, of the raw and mystical. Within the Biennale Eyfjörd confronts the historic aura of the city of Venice and nation states’ notion of the Biennale, his pointed Iceland concept anticipating the cliché-ridden expectations of the visitor. The tension resulting from this involves the viewers, taking them back to their own cultural contexts. It becomes clear that the artwork itself and its treatment of themes are by no means mere formulations in local colours; it results from a complex interplay between inner and outer influences and thus holds its ground within the international context.

Discovering our own national sensitivities in light of global interests and influences has always been one of Eyfjörd’s core aspirations. Born in 1954, he is from the generation of Icelandic artists who were influenced by 1970s international Concept Art, although he never agreed with the idea of art that exists autonomously. For Eyfjörd art is firmly anchored in the history and the mentality of a country and its society; not a hermetic artefact unto itself but an active contribution and measure of social consciousness. For Steingrimur Eyfjörd art is a way of compiling hypothesises: hypothesises on historical and cultural contexts; hypotheses on one’s own identity. They are not to be scientifically substantiated, confirmed or refuted. Eyfjörd’s art lays claim to the freedom of rhizome-like, pointed and humorist association.