Place: Reykjavik City Hall (Tjarnargata 11, 101 Reykjavik)
Period: 4th - 14th November 2022
From 4th - 14th of November, Sjana Rut will host an art exhibition at Reykjavik City Hall where she will showcase paintings from her Broken/Unbreakable project, which is based on an eponymous album.
One of Sjana’s biggest projects yet, and surely the most important one of her career and personal life, is the Broken/Unbreakable saga, which is a physical and spiritual journey of her trauma from childhood.
This project takes you on a stark emotional ride through the darkness to the light, travelling from the past to the present.
The exhibition features 36 paintings in total, painting for each song on the album as well as the cover of both chapters.
The Broken/Unbreakable project is a saga about a true story of child sexual abuse. The first part of this two-part saga, Broken, is centred in the past and reveals dark thoughts and secrets through a child’s eyes, while Unbreakable is set in the present and future offering hope and freedom.
Broken is mainly written from the child’s perspective while the abuse is happening and focuses as well on the aftermath of it, and the heaviness of dealing with it as a young adult. Broken is a heavy, fragile sphere offering little to no comfort right up until the end of that chapter, where the story gets hopeful and you feel like you can finally stop holding your breath; a big relief as you sense that something better is to come.
Unbreakable bursts into a roaring scene of strength and confidence, full of life after being freed from the chains of the past. The second chapter explodes into a vibrant landscape, it is energetic and confident while still holding onto a bit of mystery. Raw at the core, Unbreakable is straightforward with its storytelling and is quite humorous at times, all while staying true to its roots and being incredibly vulnerable and honest about the challenges and emotional tangles left by the past's shadows. The work is never truly over but where there is hope there is a way.
“It all started with the music and it evolved into so much more through the process of making this two-part saga (double LP). When I write songs I can always visualise their surroundings and atmosphere as paintings as well as see the pictures before I find the melody and words, it goes both ways.
This project differs from my previous released work because it has become so much bigger than myself and my story because it is also so many other people’s stories. What made me even more sure of making the visualisation of the music into an art exhibition was because of a family friend who is deaf, she could at least envision the music through the paintings. The art exhibition also allows people to look further into the world of this saga to better understand the story. I realised in the process how much it helped me to face the visual discomfort and nightmares and look to the future, it was also inspiring to think it could maybe help others on their own journey.”
Click here to read about each artwork.
Listen to Broken and Unbreakable on Spotify.