In The Navel of the World, Icelandic artist Sara Sigurðardóttir (b. 1993) guides us through explorations of materiality, time, and consciousness, reflecting on the shifting experiences and cataclysmic transformations of motherhood. Blending earthy textures with celestial forms, her paintings draw from volcanic landscapes, physical sensations, and spiritual visions. The exhibition’s title references an Icelandic expression for a place of central importance, linguistically tied to the womb – the navel marking our physical detachment from our mothers. It also evokes the idea of navel-gazing,’ alluding to the long-standing cultural dismissal of motherhood as an unserious subject for art. Sigurðardóttir subverts this perception by employing decorative forms and combining seemingly opposing imagery
to create her layered compositions. Working from quick sketches made during everyday moments of care, she digitally develops selected forms and cuts them from wood, using them as the foundation for her surfaces. Built up with paint scraps, marble dust, and sand, these works evoke both the raw materiality of the earth and the visceral intensity of the body in labour. Recurring motifs, such as umbilical cords, chains, and erupting landscapes, reflect the emotional complexity of motherhood: its beauty and burden, serenity and violence, its power to both bind and liberate.

Text by Millie Walton.