Volver (2023)

Volve, or Völva (noun), in Old Norse, means a female practitioner of magic, divination and prophecy; by extension, any prophetess, sooth-sayer or witch. The poem Voluspå (Völuspá) tells the story for the creation of the world and its coming end and subsequent rebirth, told to Odin by a völva. Voluspå is the best known poem of the Poetic Edda. No one knows exactly how old these poems are, the best estimate is that they can’t have been written before 985. Like most early poetry, the Eddic poems were minstrel poems, passed orally from singer to singer and from poet to poet for centuries.

In Voluspå, a volve tells the most powerful god Odin about the beginning of time, of the golden ages, and she foretells of Ragnarok, the destruction of cosmos and everything in it. And then, she sees that the earth and the sun will rise again. Life will return.

In Norwegian, plural form of volve is volver. Which makes me think of volver (verb) in Spanish means to return, to do again, to turn, and the word revolution (noun), deriving from Late Latin revolutio- "a revolving," from Latin revolvere "turn, roll back". It entered English, from Old French révolution, originally to describe celestial bodies in orbit, and it wasn’t until around 1450 it was used to mean a sudden, radical or complete change.

On my right arm, I have a tattoo of the word Drøm (dream). It’s not only a noun, but an imperative form of the verb, dream. I think about revolution too as a not only a noun, but a verb, and love as a verb, life as a verb, us a verb, me as a verb; it’s something we do.

Volver
2023
Acrylic paint and charcoal on canvas
35 x 70 cm

7 350,-
(+ shipping costs)

6-12 month installment plan available, use contact form to make an inquiry.