EXHIBITION: Hidden Stone

As part of Velferden's programme WASTE / DEPOSIT, we welcome you to this year's summer exhibition HIDDEN STONE. The exhibition consists of installations with ceramic sculptures, glaze tests and historical material from Titania and Kronos Titan´s history. 

The exhibition has a very local focus - the artist group explores the history of the white pigment titanium dioxide's industrial origins at Sandbekk, and how this world sensation from 1910 has influenced our world today. The white pigment titanium dioxide is a global color phenomenon. From Titania, ilmenite is transported to sister company Kronos Titan in Fredrikstad where it is refined into titanium dioxide. From there, the colorant circulates seemingly invisibly in a global network of systems. It is used in paint, plastic, paper, ink, cosmetics, medicine, sunscreen and millions of products that we use on a daily basis. This story is the starting point for the development project TiO2: The Materiality of White.

Over the past two years, the group of artists has visited Titania's mines and landfills and collected material from local history. Just as geologists explored the areas of Sokndal over 150 years ago in search of valuable minerals, the group has wandered the landscape, picking stones and collecting sand, clay and rust-colored soil. These finds have been brought back to the ceramics laboratory at KhiO where they have been processed in ceramic processes. In Western culture, the color white represents, among other things, purity, innocence, power and progress. By processing the color white in ceramic sculpture, the artist group MoW will investigate this symbolism by tracing the color white back to its mineral origins and its geographical origins. Its history is broad and extensive, and the seven artists each have their own unique take on it. In Western culture, the color white represents, among other things, purity, innocence, power and progress. By processing the color white in ceramic sculpture, the artist group MoW will investigate the symbolism by drawing the color white back to its mineral origin and its geographical origin.

The group explores Sokndal's geology, mining history and the white pigment titanium dioxide through fieldwork and the processing of materials in the ceramics workshop. The artists have collected rocks and sand from Titania's deposits and pieces of ilmenite from Blåfjell. These have been crushed into fine sand and mixed into ceramic glazes.

Together, the group of artists attempts to bring titanium dioxide back to its earthly origins to see what the material itself, titanium dioxide, can tell us about its connections to the landscape and history of Sokndal.