MAGIC

A rare convergence of feminist film and mythic gesture.

In September 2025, marvaða presented MAGIC. The works in the program —Volcano Saga (1989) by Joan Jonas, Women and Smoke (1971–1972) by Judy Chicago, and Hex (2025) by Hex by Katrín Helga Andrésdóttir and Sóley— are bound by a shared invocation of magical thinking as an artistic method. Each work reclaims ritual, myth, and enchantment as ways of making sense of lived experience.

Joan Jonas draws on Icelandic sagas to form a dreamlike vision where prophecy and landscape converge; Judy Chicago choreographs smoke and colour as a feminist rite, transforming atmosphere into a temporary temple; Katrín and composer Sóley conjure a contemporary hex, weaving sound, gesture, and cinematic spell into a form of resistance. Across generations, these artists demonstrate how magic—once dismissed as superstition—endures as a powerful language for reimagining identity, community, and our relationship to the forces that shape us.

The opening of MAGIC featured a screening of all three works, followed by a conversation between Hex writer and director Katrín Helga Andrésdóttir, composer and creator Sóley Stefánsdóttir, and curator Arnbjörg María Danielsen, concluding with a closing DJ set.

Documented by Vikram Pradhan.