Exhibition Josefin Arnell

Josefin Arnell’s solo exhibition at Sickhouse presents a collection of films operating through dream logic and nightmare structures, populated by her characteristic figures shaped not by fantasy alone, but by institutional power, social conditioning, and the violence of normalization.

The works explore how institutions construct the “good girl,” the “good citizen,” the ideal subject: bodies trained to comply, identities shaped through discipline, submission, and endless self-correction. Perfection becomes a form of obedience. Improvement becomes control. The desire to belong, to fit in, to be accepted, to be legible, demands a continuous reshaping of the self, a constant performance of becoming better.

The exhibition extends this logic spatially through the use of construction mesh, a material usually employed to create façades, barriers, and temporary structures. Wrapped around the outside while maintenance work is being done on the inside, it becomes a surface of control, a skin, a membrane, a structure through which the body is disciplined and remade.

Flesh and architecture collapse into one another. The visitor moves through something both protective and oppressive, both shelter and trap. What begins as discipline becomes appetite. And inside the beast, we feast.

Josefin Arnell’s work explores how violence and social hierarchies shape everyday life. Using dark humor, she stages fragile, absurd situations in which characters struggle to navigate contemporary systems and their impossible demands. Storytelling is central to her practice, which often unfolds through participatory processes and collaborative encounters.

EXHIBITION OPEN : 13-06 to 31-07
on Friday & Saturday from 12:00 to 00:00
or on request for groups and tours (mail : marie@sickhouse.nl)

OPENING WITH THE ARTIST : 13-06 from 14:00 on
(more details about the opening coming up.)