The Clarion Hotel Malmö Live in Malmo, Sweden, is a striking, beautiful venue visible on the Malmö skyline and perfectly centrally located for visitors. The hotel serves as a great place to stay, meet up for food or drinks, hold a conference, or experience music, art and design.
On the 25th floor is the sky restaurant and bar with stunning views of the city, and just below on floor 24 there is currently an exciting art project! #gallery2408 is an initiative by artist Jeanette Gostomski, who together with sound designer Silas Bieri, photographer Alexis Rodríguez Cancino and producer Jonna Eriksson, have created an artistic concept specifically made for the room.
We spoke to the team to find out more about this interesting installation that was originally planned to end in March, but as interest has increased it is now extended until end of June…
What is it about Room 2408 that makes it special and perfect for this installation?
Silas Bieri, Sound designer:
The mesmerizing view from the 24th floor of the clarion hotel over the buildings of västra hamnen to the harbor with its boats and the sight all the way to Copenhagen, appears like a texture and loosens up the visual aggressivity of the city.
It seems peaceful and calm and creates the perfect atmosphere for the sound installation. With my sounds I try to break the patterns of the everyday city soundtrack. I try to show the harmony of traffic noise, the relaxing ambiences of motor sounds but also interpret musically the environments you see but cannot reach.
The acoustic texture I choose is immersive in the room and enhances the experiencing of the Jeanette’s installation, Alexis’ photos and of course the observation through the window.
Have you ever stayed anywhere with a similar experience and did this help influence the execution of the exhibition?
Jeanette Gostomski, sculpture artist:
I have never stayed in a gallery/exhibition/hotel room before. I’d love to go to the Icehotel or the Treehotel up in northern Sweden.
The inspiration is a combination of Pippilotti Rist that gives you a total feeling based on video and art installations, Kusamas “Gleaming Lights of the souls” based on mirrors and lights, and an apartment room in Tribeca with light and sound installations, active since the 60s, that Nathan Larson told me about when we were going to work together on a project.
A space you actively walk into and immerse with the room and space with all your senses. The repetitiveness of hotel rooms is a perfect place to break a pattern we are used to and start to think about and question our surroundings. Inspire us to new ways of thinking.
We are used to so many things. But have we seen it all? Have we looked an extra time? It makes us take new paths in our own city when we look out the window and on the way home from the hotel room exhibition.
A space you actively walk into and immerse with the room and space with all your senses. The repetitiveness of hotel rooms is a perfect place to break a pattern…
– Jeanette
Inspire us to new ways of thinking.
It is also a new way for the cities visitors to discover it in depth. Think of a toothbrush, Does it have to look that way? I just take it to a bigger scale.
The exhibition includes visual and audio elements, are any other senses involved or any interactive elements in the installation?
Jonna Eriksson, producer:
I would definitely like to lift the tactile elements of the installation. The sculpture installation has elements from different parts of the area outside the glass wall: elevator wires from Turning Torso (Malmö’s tallest building), old iron stencils that was used to cut out boat parts at Varvsstaden, big iron pieces used in Lantmännens large silos and publications from Malmö University.
We move into the buildings and move around in a labyrinth of objects that all inhabits a history closely connected to the history of the city. When you run your fingers over the metal pieces you can still feel the dust. It settles on your fingertips and at once you are as much a part of the experience as you are an observer of it. Movement is a big part of the experience.
Whenever you shift your position the experience will shift, just as much as it shifts every time sunset and every sunrise. We count the room and everything in it as part of the installation, so whenever you step into it you immediately start interacting with it.
Are there plans to have future exhibitions in room 2408?
Alexis Rodríguez Cancino, photographer:
From my side I think it is good to note the uniqueness of being able to experience a gallery without usual time restrictions, which we often face at “normal” galleries. In that matter a big reference for me has been “Satantango” by Bela Tarr, a cinema pioneer portraying the simplicity of daily urban life enhanced by new time boundaries in story telling.
Can we perceive differently day-to-day life, architecture and soundscapes by simply dedicating -more- time to appreciate it?
– Alexis
Can we perceive differently day-to-day life, architecture and soundscapes by simply dedicating -more- time to appreciate it? A change of our appreciation routines. This goes also with our ways of discovery, which in the situation we are in now have become a notion to explore.
Therefore I believe this concept to be of interest in many settings and different places, and creating site specific installations like this one in other hotels or spaces could really bring extra value to whatever city it is in.
For more information or to stay at the Clarion Live Malmo visit Nordic Choice Hotels – catch a night there before the exhibition ends in June!
Interview by Alex & Claire Minnis
