Six questions for
Ingeborg Tysse

How do you describe your own art practice?

I work with the ‘in-between’ spaces and in a spectrum where the organic meets the synthetic, wild meets tamed and the old meets the re-imagined. This shapes as sculpture, installation, weaving, video and costumes, within landscapes inhabited by trollish creatures. It is a process of assembling metaphorical narratives and scavenging a lot of local materials that I find or search for, such as left over wood, bird feathers, materials from garbage dumps and discarded interior objects. I treat the found elements as carriers of history and active participants with their own agency. By merging traditional crafts like woodcarving and weaving with the hyper-synthetic and digital elements, I speak about memory, replacement and environmental care.

Which question or theme is central in your work?

Central to my practice is the exploration of prosthetics as extensions of body, space, and time. I am interested in how bodies, identities, histories and environments adjust to loss and synthetic intervention. Prosthetics have become a metaphor for mental and metaphysical adaptation—material and phantom connections that exist in the space of physical appearance. In a sense I believe that what we surround ourselves with, somehow becomes us in many ways- even if it’s a piece of furniture or clothing we grew up with, it finds its way into our bodies. Thinking of my surroundings as alive and delving into animism is a frequent theme that I actively work with.

What was your first experience with art?

I have a lot of vivid childhood memories that shaped my practice today. One is dressing up in costumes and playing pretend theatre with my big sister as a kid. We had two big plastic bags of strange clothes and accessories from all kinds of eras and styles. There was a feeling that the bags were endless. My mother watched all our performances. Another magical memory is the smell of my grandparent’s basement, this raw and wild smell, which I remember strongly wanting to put into a little container. The forest and birdwatching with my father also had a big input on me. Later, in a transaction where playing became creating, I started building worlds in plasticine, together with two good childhood friends, and we created these shelving systems where each shelf had its own universe and we could choose which one to drag out and continue to create, build and exist within.

My first encounter with visual art in an institution must be when I saw the weavings of Norwegian artist Frida Hansen in Stavanger Art Museum when I was quite young. My first woodwork creation of my own was carving a hole in our wooden dinner table, little by little and hiding it under my dinner plate, storing salt and other stuff in it.

What is your greatest source of inspiration?

I am inspired by stories and myths, especially the idea that places and objects contain histories. I find a great deal of inspiration in birdwatching as well, in the city as in nature. Walking in cities can be a good way of getting my mind going, observing how nature persists and adapts within the industrial environments. Crows and Seagulls unwrapping a drunk kebab on the street a Sunday morning can be a melancholically funny inspiration. Another great inspiration is fashion with all its contrasts.

What do you need in order to create your work?

Space, music and a free headspace allowing an organic flow. Also walking. I need some warming up to get into my zone, which differ from process to process, but time and my notebook is a necessity. Often, my friends and colleagues with their gaze are also a needed.

What work or artist has most recently surprised you?

Leonora Carrington continues to amaze and surprise me. I recently read her book “The Hearing Trumpet”, and her surrealistic and magical world is a place I never want to leave.