Maria Johansson: Objects, about [signed]

In search for the perfect object During the last 15 years, Maria Johansson has been building "The Collection of the Perfect Objects". Since they were nowhere to be found she made them herself... The collaboration with the curator Sujy Lee began in 2018 at Iaspis. Like archivists, they work to examine and document the collection, which currently consists of 185 Objects.  The book has 18 English and 15 Swedish texts. All other texts are in English. Maria Johansson is a material-based artist, working in Stockholm. She has a MFA from Konstfack University of Arts Crafts 2009. Maria Johansson's foreword: My artistic practice builds upon the fascination of the handy and inventive people around me, growing up in Nordanå, a small village in the south of Sweden. I collect, search, disassemble, construct, combine, number, archive and reuse. The sculptures, called Objects, both celebrate and criticize the material society. I do not design function, but thoughts about function and consumption. Since 2006 I have been building The Collection of the Perfect Objects. As they did not exist, I had to make them myself. Every Object is a work as is the whole Collection in itself. During my residency at IASPIS, I started to collaborate with curator and editor Sujy Lee. We have been acting archivists in this art project, documenting and researching the Collection in different ways. Part of the study was to examine a selection of Objects together with other contributors who were invited to write texts based on the Objects and their titles. In dialogue with photographer Sara Danielsson, each Object got to decide the visual conditions for each picture. Graphic designer Karin Rosenberg then contributed with her interpretation of the material we had gathered. All these layers of interpretations became yet another work, the book that you are holding in your hands. -