heimir snær
Solo exhibition, curated by Richard Vailati
The Dream of the Benzene Ring is a visual project which combines figurative painting accompanied with auditory installations. The project is inspired by standardized hazard symbols, commonly found on petroleum based products such as painting mediums.
The scenes depicted on these hazard symbols tell of a grim future, akin to foreboding prophecies yet to unfold. Stemming from a standardized visual iconography, meant to transcend any language barrier, the dire situations depicted in them are made even stranger due to its sleek, cut and dry, black and white motif that is void of all humanity. By making them bleed through the veil of the painted world, these harrowing scenes are brought closer through the flesh of sharp but oddly sweet smelling oil paint.
Utilizing sound installations, each work will have an
accompanying spoken word piece that connects voices possibly touched by each tragic warning. These voices will forward a prophecy, each connected to its painted counterpart.
Voice actors:
Acute Toxicity: Robert Williams
Environmental Danger: Julien Nayet-Pelletier
Fire Hazard: Halldór Ragnarsson
Carcinogen: Danielle Draik
Corrosive Substance: Sunniva Allanic
Music for Explosive Danger: Ingimundur Gudmundsson
Sticker printing: Lu Frazer (@wetbog)
Heartfelt thanks to: Markús Bjarnason,
Vitalina Kulynych, Richard Vailati
“Bergmál og Sjávarljós” @ Akranes Lighthouse, April 2026
Group exhibition, curated by Richard Vailati
Title: Fyrsta Farrými
Site specific light sculpture showcased at Bergmál & Sjávarljós in the Akranes Lighthouse April 2026.
Between the fixed points of the lighthouse at the edge of the coastal town of Akranes and the pulsar LGM-1 (PSR B1919+21) in the constellation Vulpecula, lie a 1000 lightyears. Bridging these two flickering bodies of light stands a wormhole, warping matter around it and drumming the universe’s beat. A gesture towards galactic light keeping and listening for little green men.
Special thanks goes towards Anders Vange at Reykjavík Glass , Sandijs Ruluks and of course Richard Vailati.
Solo exhibition
How do we allot the energy we use each day? Or over a lifetime?
What form does it manifest as? Do you feel it inside your chest? In your stomach? Does it leave you when you breathe?
Spoons can be a sign for energy. They can hold something we can consume and can be used as symbols for for energy used in mundane activities (e.g. Spoon theory). Spoons are measurement devices for many different phenomena. They can represent a time and place, the Icelandic word for spoon, skeið, can represent a period of time as well. Whether eternal or a period of a person's life. With these works my intention was to get closer to eternity in the mundane, to use the spoon as a tool to capture energy that is simultaneously close but far away from us.
Special thanks to Elvar Gunnarsson, Markús Bjarnason, Ingiríður Halldórsdóttir, Emil Gunnarsson og Vala Sigþrúðar-Jónsdóttir.
Group exhibiton, curated by Daníel Björnsson
Title: SunPath
It is said that art was born from the silhouette of a long lost lover.
In the same vein the shadow is a part of us as well. Acting as one half of a balanced whole, the shadow along with light is what comprises our psyche according to Jungian psychology, as well as being the elements which give our world definition. By repurposing devices meant to measure time and weather, the intention of my practice is to spur on a reconnection to one's kith and kin and finding the human in this world which moves us.
Solo exhibition
This exhibition was a part of the MA graduation project in 2025.
Per Solem is a part of a continuing project of utilising time measuring devices as art producing objects. Working through different media and ephemera this series of works calls out to various places through time. Going through a daily ritual of collecting stellar evidence, the mundane suddenly becomes loaded with meaning. It is a way of capturing a line and this line is our movement.
Graduate group show from the BA program at UoC, Carlisle UK. Culminating from a year worth of research and fabrication, this installation encapsulated my time spent at UoC.
From the exhibition text:
“Drawing from the mindscape of his childhood Heimir Snær has created a fantastical parallel that hones in on objects and symbols encountered in an environment that borders between industry and the ocean, occupied by a being bound in an impossible space. Influenced by the likes of Paul McCarthy, James Ensor, Sandra Mujinga, Mike Nelson and Meret Oppenheim, Heimir envisions an alternate reality, set in a liminal space where time is simultaneously regulated and limitless, where work is done for the sake of work. Incorporating elements of childlike interpretation and absurdist creations, he invokes a feverish feeling of isolation incorporated with a precariousness of the lived in space.”
The title of the work draws from the ambiguous but multi purpose Icelandic word Jæja, used for example to communicate a readiness to work and resembles babble words like dada and mama.