The Institut suédois is closed on 1 May 2024.
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Artist-in-residence: Souvenirs perdus by Anna Mezey 

This summer, the Institut Suédois has invited Anna Mezey to develop her artwork Souvenirs perdus (lost memories). Her project is to further enrich an investigation of memory and its highly personal and incomplete nature - also by inviting our visitors to share their own lost memories.
French Hungarian ictionary open on the word souvenir/Memory

Anna Mezey remembers walking along a street in Budapest with her brother and father. She was six or seven, her brother was four years older; they held hands. That’s her only memory of him. She only met him on this occasion and has had no news from him since. He lived with his mother in Budapest while Anna lived in Sweden with their father. Souvenirs perdus plunges us into the artist’s lost past, combining real facts and reminiscences in the form of texts that transcribe anecdotes told by family members and photos of places that remind her of her brother.

Through her family history, Anna Mezey teaches us to make our own memories come alive and to analyse them. This artist in residence programme at the Institut Suédois is an opportunity for her to invite the public to tell her an important family memory. It encourages us to think about how to come to terms with the past as it fades away over time and, because it only exists in our minds, as it necessarily escapes us.

Useful information:

  • Wednesday – Sunday / 12:00 – 18:00
  • The artist will regularly be present to meet visitors. The days on which she will be present will be posted inside her studio.
  • To ensure that everybody is protected and that events run smoothly, our team is implementing a number of hygiene and safety measures. Please read the barrier gestures by clicking here.

Institut suédois 50 years in 2021! This event forms part of our anniversary programme dedicated to the theme of Friendship. Click here to learn more.