Habby Osk

Lives and works in Reykjavík, Iceland

Artist statement

Habby Osk’s work rests upon basic physics - balance, movement and time. These concepts are the concrete medium for her artistic practice which toys with the limits of balance and stability using gravity and force. Through sculpture, photography, and installations, Habby reveals a tension between movement and stillness by placing objects in seemingly unstable positions, capturing a moment of perpetual precarity. These compositions of fragility emphasize the potential for destruction but within an equally mirrored state of balance and stability. An anchor creates this paradoxical condition of existence whereby it is both physically strong and structural crutch, but its state as such serves to invoke its own fragility. She approaches this simultaneously with playfulness and suspense, probing how far objects can go without tipping over and capturing that momentary stillness before an inevitable collapse or transformation over time. Habby employs a range of materials to underpin the relationship between time and physicality. Emphasizing the fragility within stability, Habby uses devices that are considered sturdy, such as concrete or wood for a singular point of structural support, delicately balanced to uphold the whole piece, the object of strength being then the most fragile component. For her photographic work, she casts food such as jello, and sugar. As a malleable substance with a temporary existence, they physically and conceptually invite destruction and mortality. In...

Artwork