– Supermarket Art Magazine editorial 2025
We thought that last year would have been the final edition of Supermarket – yet here we are, once again, despite the odds. The past few years have not been an easy ride, and though we are close to celebrating our 20th anniversary it often feels like we are stuck in the same place where we were a decade ago. The yearly cycle of searching for a venue, fundraising and financial insecurity, together with our exhibitors’ funding opportunities being further reduced, have taken their toll.
So why are we still struggling on, year after year? Well…it’s hard to say. Many of you artists and art organisers know this mix of feelings all too well. That stubborn dedication to the cause, the pleasure-in-pain satisfaction from the work, the culmination of the efforts and energy in an event, followed by the post-production lows.
Perhaps the origin of the word passion – to suffer – has something to say about this. Passions are not easy emotions. They are all the irrational feelings and instincts we are trying to suppress, but they also encompass all that raw powerful force that drives us forward. “They attack the soul and force the body to commit inappropriate actions,” writes Descartes in his treaty The Passions of the Souls. Oh, the romantic passion, the Eros, the sex and love – where it all started with an apple and a whisper in the ear. The eternal subject of art, the longing of the sensuous body and the desire for satisfaction.
But there are passions much more exciting than the ones capturing the body. In the same text Descartes distinguishes six basic types of passion: wonder, love, hatred, desire, joy, and sadness, as well as all the other blends that derive from those. There is intellectual passion, passion for books or obscure philosophical arguments, ardour for nature, devotion to god, or the visionary search for a better society. Passion is above all the very essence of creation. Art without passion and desire to captivate the spectator, be it with beauty, cause or concept, what kind of art would that be?
The line is thin between passion and obsession, we can see that slight glimpse of madness in every artist and artist-run organisation. To bring a bit of beauty to the world, question the established order, connect artists and bring audiences together. Aren’t we all a bit possessed here by the art demon? Why else would we bother to work on underpaid art projects, spend hours in the studio making time-consuming artworks that might never be seen or sold, write all the grant applications and project plans, and endure the mingling at art events with cheap wine in hand, all of this while struggling with the constant self-doubt and ‘why the hell didn’t I study medicine instead?’
I have recently developed an interest in medieval art, and as a part of my research I have been reading a bit on medieval rites of passion. Like in so many other periods of the past and even present, passion has been seen as something to be suppressed and navigated by a set of rules. The concept of courtly love was one such tool for socially restricting passion, sung about across counties by troubadours and broken-hearted lovers. Courtly love is a strange and elusive term of passion at the same time pure and adulterous, where the woman is unreachable, yet her bare breast tantalising, the knight in shining armor must pass quests and trials only to remain unsure as to whether he will perpetually desire or one lucky day physically consummate, in the end advised to cure his broken heart by soaking his feet in warm bath with chamomile, and a diet of lamb, lettuce, and ripe fruit. Put it to test next time your heart is aching. All of this is captured in magnificent, colourfully illuminated manuscripts where chores of daily life intertwine with passionate advances, forces of nature, strange beasts and gores of war, all overseen with a blessing by a lecherous priest.
That is to say, passions are a bizarre but special force that drives us forward as artists, and that has also been driving this fair year after year. So is it love, is it persistence…? Supermarket 2025 calls out to that wild, all-consuming and sometimes irrational sensation. Where’s the thrill and joy and confusion and inner turmoil? What happened to sexy art? In this magazine’s edition you will find articles that touch upon all sorts of passions.
-)Alida Ivanov dives into what’s currently hot and sexy on the Swedish art scene presenting a mix of artists and art spaces in Stockholm and beyond. What have you been missing out? Check her list to make sure you’re still in the game.
-)Vilma Lorena Parada presents two artists from Cuba, Frank Lahera O’Callaghan and Ernesto Sánchez Núñez. Initially meant to take part as exhibitors in Supermarket with the art space LA Art Stockholm, they had to withdraw their participation. Instead you get to read about their artistic journey and the sacrifices art often demands from artists in Parada’s article The Thin Art Line.
-)In FRINGE Warszawa – The Changing Landscape of Artist-Run Warsaw, we get an insight into the development of the independent art in Warsaw in the past years through the eyes of the 2024 FRINGE Warszawa organisational team. What’s the fringe scene like in comparison to the one we know, how does one start a fringe movement, and what’s there to expect from the coming years?
-)Hanna Granlund lets us into the queer clubbing scene in Stockholm in her article in Allow Me to Set the Scene … If you haven’t yet heard of the darkroomdarkroom, now is your chance to put on your latex costume and set off to explore the city’s nightlife.
-)Jin Hwa Anna Borstam takes us further beyond Sweden on a trip to Korea to explore the artist-run spaces across the country with the specific conditions in each city and the approaches that the organisations use. At the same time she taps into her personal history as a Korean adoptee. A homecoming can take on different shapes, tracking one’s history, connecting to other artists or finding projects that light your flame.
Enjoy the reading, enjoy the fair. Bring on the passion, stop overthinking for a bit and just have fun with the art.
Alice Máselníková, editor-in-chief
