Artist in Residence, Stockholm, 3 June – 28 August 2024

Ramona Salo is an artist and designer living and working in Gáivuotna (Sapmi). Her works are rooted in Sámi culture, where thoughts about time, connection to nature and Indigenous philosophies are tools for navigating in different landscapes. Her practice focuses on textile work in contact with the body and landscape and tells stories across time and space. She also explores her objects as storytellers through performance art. In her work, she describes poetic landscapes that carry with them cultural and personal memories. She works from the perspective that indigenous people are a people of the world, and through her work she conveys this in a global and inclusive way. She is also a fashion designer, who operates in the liminal space between art and design.

Jens Kristian Nilsen

Ramona Salo. Photo: Jens Kristian Nilsen.

During her IASPIS residency she will continue working on her exploration of the landscape between local and global, indigenous people and world culture, and fashion and duodji/crafts/art. Having a base in Stockholm will contribute to new perspectives to understand and communicate these themes, and she will also investigate Swedish design that operates in similar fields. She also wants to expand her network with Sami artists in Stockholm, and see what opportunities open during the research period.

Ramona Salo has a Master’s degree from the National Academy of the Arts (KHiO) in Oslo (2018). She also holds a Bachelor’s degree in Criminology from the Faculty of Law at University of Oslo (2013), and a Bachelor’s degree in Art and Design from the Oslo Metropolitan University (2015). She also studied subjects in Art history and Cultural history at University of Oslo.

She has participated in several exhibitions, such as Travel as a Tool (1st June 2020 – 7th March 2021) and had four solo exhibitions: Center of Northern peoples / Davvi álbmogiid guovddášin Gaivoutna/Kåfjord in 2019 and 2023, Akershus Art Centre (now Nitja) in 2019 and the exhibtion “Min árktalaš arkiiva”/”Our arctic archive” at Nordover Svalbard, (04.11.2023 – 14.04.2024), in collaboration with choregrapher Katarina Skår Lisa. Her work has been purchased by the Norwegian National Museum, Oslo (2019), RiddoDuottarMuseat The Sámi Art Collection (2019, 2023), Center of Northern peoples / Davvi álbmogiid guovddáš,Sápmi (2019,2023), the Nordenfjeldske National Museum of Decorative Arts and Design, Trondheim (2020) and Nordnorsk Kunstmuseum (2023). In 2019 she was the recipient of the Design and Architecture Norway DOGA award for newcomers, and won first place in the 2019 Diploma Selection contest at Designblok in Prague.Her fashion design collections have been shown at several worldwide fashion events, such as Beijing (2014), Copenhagen (2018), Prague (2018,2019,2023) and Mexico City (2023). In 2019 Salo was included in the D2 Magazine list «30 under 30 Lederstjerner», a selection of 30 people under 30 who will make the world more sustainable through ideas, action or leadership skills.