What. Research residency
When. July and September-October 2024
Where.  Jokkmokk
Organizers. Jokkmokk Municipality, Resurscentrum för konst
Who. Linnea Johnels b. 1991 Umeå/Ubmeje
Website. @linneajohnels

In her research-grounded installations and texts, Linnea Johnels approaches spectral actors to explore the troubled foundations of western societies. These historical agents, that still hold power, allow her to understand and engage materials such as archives, stones and bacteria, as critical storytellers. She traces connections, in themes and motifs, between colonialism and climate collapse, via exploitative capitalism and back to deep time. Desire for goods, knowledge or people, combined with fear for the unfolding polycrisis, are recurring tensions in her work.
 
Johnels’ recent project is an inquiry into western knowledge production that began from an encounter with a fish named after her grandfather Alf - Chrysichthys johnelsi. During the research, she traced the naming of the fish to a scientific expedition in the Gambia during British colonial rule and to the infrastructural conditions at the Swedish Museum of Natural History.
 
Scientific expeditions, the naming of species and the natural history museum all connect back to the work of the botanist Carl Linnaeus, the father of modern taxonomy and the central figure of Johnels current research. His system for naming and categorising species is still in use today, and nature is often understood through this systematic filter. 
 
During her stay in Jokkmokk, Johnels will continue her research into Linnaeus’ work and legacy, with a focus on his journey to Lapland in 1732. She aims to understand the consequences of the Enlightenment view of nature as being made up of discrete entities and exploitable, as well as to understand alternative ways to perceive nature and knowledge. During the summer and as an extended part of the residency, Johnels hiked seven days through Badjelánnda following in Linnaeus footsteps from his journey between Huhttán/Kvikkjokk to the Norwegian coast. 
 
Johnels holds an MA in Art and Ecology from Goldsmiths University, a BA in philosophy from Södertörns Högskola and a BFA from Umeå Konsthögskola.