Portal Propagations – An Exhibition
The iconic 11th-century northern portal of Urnes Stave Church is a hyper-reproduced heritage object. As a monument, it is maintained in the collective cultural memory by the circulation of its images. This exhibition gathers many of those reproductions from the past two centuries, inviting reflection over the question how is the monument reproduced, whilst its reproduced image also makes the monument? As an assemblage, the exhibition asks the viewer what effect does the circulation of such images have on the way we perceive the monument itself?
Across two tables in the AHO Library, viewers were presented with images of the stave church and its portal. The first table gathered images that shared a goal of achieving objective proximity, to document and preserve the stave church ornamentation through drawings, plaster casts and digital scans. Despite this common goal each exhibits difference, and the viewer is prompted to consider what is lost in reproduction, and what is gained? The second table presented reproductions that subjectively transform the image, extending its growth into a multiplicity of contexts through tattoos, record covers, commercial packaging and museum merchandise. This assemblage demonstrates how the portal continues to acquire multiple meanings, presenting challenges for communication as part of the monument’s ongoing conservation. It asks; as an object maintained in the collective cultural memory through its reproduced image, must then conservation extend beyond the material of the monument itself?
Through biological metaphors of reproduction, the exhibition showed how the monument lives and evolves through its reproductions. The images were displayed between new propagations of living plants, and asks; how is the portal propagated, and how does it continue to grow?
The exhibtion is curated by Nick Walkley, and held in connection with his defence of the PhD thesis Portal Propagations: Reproduction, Reception, and Rediscovery in the Life of the Urnes Portal on Friday 7th March.
People involved
