January 18 - March 8, 2025
Opening reception on Saturday, January 18 at 12-16
Galleri Helle Knudsen, Stockholm
Galleri Helle Knudsen is pleased to present a solo exhibition with Britta Marakatt-Labba. The exhibition, Underjordens Eko (The Echo of the Underground), explores how human intervention in nature affects the earth and the lives depending on it. It illuminates and investigates what happens beneath the earth’s surface and what might be revealed in the future.
Through embroidery, Marakatt-Labba highlights current environmental issues and illustrates the impact of mining. Combining themes such as mythology, history, and daily life, she creates poetic, thought-provoking works that reflect on the consequences of our actions—not only for our present and future but also for the underworld, which, according to Sámi mythology, mirrors our own.
Britta Marakatt-Labba, born in 1951 and raised in a reindeer-herding family in the Lainovuoma Sámi village, began her artistic career in 1979 after completing studies at the School of Design and Crafts in Gothenburg. In 1978, she helped establish the Masi Group and was involved in building a Sámi artists’ organization the following year. In the 1980s, she participated in the Alta protests, which she depicted in her well-known work The Crows (1981).
Today, she lives and works in Övre Soppero and has been active as an artist for over 40 years. Her international breakthrough came in 2017 when her 24-meter-long embroidery Historjá (2003-2007) was exhibited at the prestigious contemporary art exhibition Documenta 14. Her life and artistry were portrayed in the film Historjá – Stitching for Sápmi (2022).
Britta Marakatt-Labba has received several awards, including Illis Quorum (2017), the Stig Dagerman Prize (2019), and the Prince Eugen Medal (2020). In 2022, she participated in the main exhibition, The Milk of Dreams, at the Venice Biennale, and in 2024, the National Museum in Oslo presented her extensive retrospective, Sharp Stitches. The exhibition continued to the KIN Museum in Kiruna and will also be displayed at Moderna Museet in Stockholm, opening in May 2025.
The Echo of the Underground marks Britta Marakatt-Labba’s fourth major collaboration with Galleri Helle Knudsen. Previous exhibitions include:
2016: Tracks in the Snow after Migration with Reindeer Herd - duo exhibition with Tomas Colbengtson
2018: Dawn - duo exhibition with Tomas Colbengtson
2023: The Unsaid - solo exhibition at Market Art Fair
Questions about Britta Marakatt-Labba, embroideries, etc.: info@gallerihelle.com / +46 70 416 44 40
Press inquiries: mail@gallerihelle.com
Britta Marakatt-Labba, Dubbelspår (Double tracks), 2024. Embroidery and appliqué on linen, 35 x 156 cm
Britta Marakatt-Labba, Ut ur mörkret (Out of the Darkness), 2023. Embroidery and appliqué on linen, 41 x 54 cm