HER STORY – THE COAT begins where mythology, historical possibility and artistic imagination meet.

 

Inspired by the Nordic myth of Skogsrå and by Swedish author Alice Lyttkens' hypothesis that women accused of adultery were punished by having the back of their only garment torn open before being cast out, the exhibition asks a simple but profound question:

How does a woman survive after being cast out?

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The Questions

If she had to survive...

What could she use to mend the tear in the back?

What remained?

What could become protection?

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Through wearable art, leather, hair, photography, paintings, and video, the exhibition moves between mythology, women's history and contemporary questions of identity, dignity and resilience.

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The Work

HER STORY – THE COAT brings together

• wearable artworks - coats from The Skogsrå Collection

• leather works sewn with the artist's own hair

• ​felted hair coat from the artist's own hair (a slow-making work-in-progress developed with each exhibition)

• photography

• paintings

• video

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Each work approaches the same question from a different perspective.

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The Materials

Leather that has already lived another life.

Hair gathered over time.

Leaves, bark and reclaimed materials from the forest.

Repurposed textiles carrying traces of previous lives.

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The Body
The leather used is given by other women and is sewn with the artist's own hair because

it is hers to give. It belongs to her body, and she decide what it becomes.

Hair is both intimate and political.
It carries ideas of femininity, identity, beauty and control.

By stitching with her own hair, the artist work with what remains when everything

else has been taken away.

The act is slow.

The act of making allows the work to reveal itself.​

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The Skogsrå Collection

Handcrafted, tailor-made coats created from repurposed textiles.

Each coat carries a woman's story of protection, resilience and care.

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Explore The Collections →

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The Video

The video reveals the process behind the leather coat.

Each stitch is made with the artist's own hair.

Slowly, the coat takes shape before finally being worn.

 

The work stands as both a gesture of protection and a memorial to

women murdered by men close to them.

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​Photography

The leather coat is carried by the artist herself.

Photographed in the forest and printed on heavy watercolour paper, the three black-and-white works become quiet extensions of the exhibition—where body, landscape and memory meet.

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