Heaven and Earth

Hildur Hákonardóttir is an Icelandic visual artist and writer. She played an active role in the women’s rights movement during the 1970s and served as headmistress of the Icelandic College of Arts and Crafts from 1975 to 1978. From early on, Hildur attracted attention for the political stance evident in her work. She addressed the status of women, advocated for equality, and criticised class divisions within Icelandic society. In more recent years, she has also spoken out on behalf of environmental protection, engaged in the cultivation of useful plants, and pursued her writing.

During the 1970s, the role of art in contemporary society was widely debated, and political engagement appeared forcefully in the works of artists who responded to the pressing issues of their time. Women’s liberation and environmental concerns were often at the forefront. The struggle for recognition of textile art coincided with the broader fight for gender equality, and gradually women’s skills and knowledge came to be valued on their own terms. Hildur is among the pioneers of textile art in Iceland and has made conscious use of weaving in her artistic practice. Weaving has a long history and preserves knowledge passed down from woman to woman over centuries. Her works refer to age-old craftsmanship, women’s culture, and the history of visual art in Iceland.

In the 1980s, Hildur increasingly drew inspiration from nature and the landscape. Heaven and Earth (1982) is a woven wall tapestry in which the green of the earth merges with the blue of the sky. In front of the tapestry stands a kind of plant pyramid: a man-made structure of plexiglass enclosing a repeated photograph of a clearly defined patch of vegetation—an elf hill located in a field on the artist’s own land. In this work, Hildur reflects on time and the interconnectedness of things. The ancient pyramid form may symbolise power structures within society, where one figure stands at the top while others are systematically arranged below.