The Research Catalogue (RC) is a non-commercial, collaboration and publishing platform for artistic research provided by the
Society for Artistic Research. The RC is free to use for artists and
researchers. It
serves also as a backbone for teaching purposes, student assessment, peer review workflows and research funding administration. It strives to be
an open space for experimentation and exchange.
recent activities
Bird → ∞
(2025)
Kirill Arkadiev
I work at the boundary where a finite biological object asymptotically approaches zero and, through this disappearance, gives birth to an infinite aesthetic event — a singularity.
The series “Singularity of Beauty” is an ongoing investigation into the moment when decay, entropy, and controlled human intervention collide to rupture the visible world and generate a new, non-representational order.
Method: Asymptotic Ritual
A chosen organic system (bird, bouquet, insect colony, fungal network) is placed on a prepared surface and deliberately abandoned to natural forces — heat, humidity, insects, gravity, time.
During a fixed ritual period (7 days in the current cycle), the object decays following an exponential law analogous to f(t) = a·e⁻ᵏᵗ. The artist is absent; only documentation occurs.
At t → ∞ (practically: when the biological object approaches zero), the artist re-enters as a second asymptotic operator. Selective pigment application, removal of material, and layering transform the residue into a visual limit — a singularity point where the initial object has vanished, yet infinite meaning emerges.
The final state is neither representation nor abstraction; it is the frozen event of the limit itself.
Core Principles
Decay is not a theme; it is the first author.
Time is treated as a physical material with measurable half-life.
Human intervention functions as a controlled perturbation that forces the system past its natural equilibrium into aesthetic infinity.
The resulting image is a palimpsest of two incompatible temporalities: biological time (unstoppable) and artistic time (intermittent, intentional).
The “demon” is not a depicted figure but the mathematical event of the singularity: the instant when order, passing through zero, becomes infinite and alien.
Iceland University of the Arts - Welcome to RC
(2025)
Sigmundur Pall Freysteinsson
This exposition gathers all the essential information needed to get started with the Research Catalogue (RC) platform at the Iceland University of the Arts (IUA). It offers a clear overview of how to create a profile, start an exposition, and navigate the basic functions of the platform. The goal is to provide staff with a central reference point for working with RC in the context of artistic research and institutional use.
recent publications
Duration through Repetition - Revisiting as Method
(2025)
Annette Arlander
This exposition proposes revisiting as a method for engaging with long term artistic research. The method was developed while returning to a series of twelve year-long works based on repetition called Animal Years (2002-2014) in the context of the Academy of Finland funded research project How To Do Things With Performance (2016-2020). The same method was further explored as an artistic tool in the project Pondering with Pines (2022-2024). The method could be generalised into revisiting understood as return and repeat, recycle and recombine, reflect and reconsider and adapted to many types of artistic practices.
När blir sångaren konstnär
(2025)
Martin Hellström
When does the singer become an artist?
We ran an opera laboratory at the Department of Opera at Stockholm University of the Arts, during the years 2017-2020.
With the searchlight focused on the creativity of the singer, we wanted to explore the borderland between the rehearsed and the spontaneous, in the art of performing opera.
Our basic questions were:
-when does the performance of the opera singer, which requires a high level of technical perfection, open up towards the unpredictable, creative moment?
-Where is the border line between interpretation and improvisation, does it even exist?
We commissioned a mini-opera to use as working material;Camilles irrfärder & äventyr, composed by Petter Ekman to a libretto by Tuvalisa Rangström. Windows for improvisation were included in the score, where the performers can play with text, rythm, melody or structure in different ways. In the work we alternated between artistic experiments and reflection. The ensemble reflected on how the different games and methods opened or closed the creative flow, and how the improvisations affected the performers' relationship to the material. A parallel focus was how the singers were inspired to change or expand their voices. We have found new methods in the work of developing the creative ability and force of the opera singer. We have applied the methods in different ways in higher education for Opera singers, developing new pedagogic approaches in the process.
Bus Stop
(2025)
Julija Jonas
This exposition reflects on the phenomenon of the public transport stop as a metaphorical framework for the condition of migration and the figure of the waiting individual. By centering the act of waiting, this research examines how mutual understanding and cultural translation unfold within intercultural encounters. The bus stop serves as both a physical site and a symbolic threshold, a space of transition, suspension, and projection toward an uncertain future. Within this context, the project traces the transformative phases of subjectivity experienced during emigration, emphasizing the temporal dimension of waiting, expectation, and the tension inherent in moments of immobility. The final installation is situated directly within the public sphere, specifically at bus stops, where the object destabilizes the everyday rhythm of transit. By oscillating between staged intervention and authentic environment, the project foregrounds the paradoxical beauty of stillness, alongside the latent unease of anticipation.