Theresa Traore Dahlberg: “Anything Can Become Anything” Text by Natalia Muntean Theresa Traore Dahlberg says she always needed to collect, but starting art school and becoming a mother made her take the time to go further and look at what she collected from different angles. Stones, fabrics, photos, metal – she brings them home and finds a place for them in her works. Anything can become anything if you put the time into it and you stay with it,” says the artist, who grew up between Sweden and Burkina Faso and works across sculpture, installation, and documentary film. Her films, among them Ouaga Girls and The Ambassador’s Wife, have screened at Toronto, Berlin, and the Hammer Museum; her sculptures transform decommissioned industrial materials into what she calls Lings: new beings emerging from old, sometimes violent, matter. Traore Dahlberg is currently one of eight artists in Earthly Bodies Born of Love at Verket, the historic ironworks in Avesta, curated by Karolina Aastrup and Sona Stepanyan and on display until 20 September 2026. She is also at work on a major public commission in Gothenburg, due in 2029. Natalia Muntean: Tell me about Signals Beyond 2025, the body of work you’re exhibiting at Avesta Art, as part of the Earthly Bodies Born of Love exhibition.Theresa Traore Dahlberg: It started with the curator, Sona Stepanyan, who saw an exhibition I was part of at Liljevalchs, Stockholm Cosmologies, and asked me to participate. I had actually exhibited parts of this material the summer before, at the Helsinki Biennial, with a body of work called Signals Beyond 2025. And it’s material I usually work with, copper cards from a circuit factory that keep coming back in different forms. For Helsinki, they asked me to come up with a work made specifically from materials sourced in Finland, so I started working with these silver cards, material from the shift between 3G and 4G, that had been used in communication cards, radio, and all kinds of communication infrastructure. The Biennial’s theme was non-human agencies, so for me it became about using these cards to build very abstract bird-and-place forms. I call these formations Lings, like a fledgling. Octavia Butler wrote about fledglings, when a bird is born but can’t fly yet. But for me, these aren’t necessarily birds, but beings that are coming up, new, open to the world. There’s an interaction between them, but they’re also coming out of this landscape of old material. So it’s about transformation – new narratives coming out of old, sometimes violent, material. Photography by Saskia Clarke NM: Does working on a group exhibition with people from such different countries influence your perspective on your own work?TTD: There were a lot of monumental installations, so we had to find the balance where each work gets the light it needs, but still works together. It’s such a fine difference because with my piece, when it’s a little darker, it becomes gold; a little lighter, it becomes silver. I try to find the balance where it feels almost like a water surface and like the material is breathing. NM: How does the Avesta Art space itself affect the work?TTD: Avesta Art is a remarkable post-industrial space, so there is already a dialogue between the architecture and the materials I work with. The materials often originate from industrial processes, and in a way, they return to an industrial environment. The scale of the building, its high ceilings, the light, and the surrounding atmosphere all become part of the work. I also like to keep the materials in the space for a while before the installation is finalised, allowing them to absorb something of the environment. They almost marinate in the space until they feel as though they belong there. NM: The exhibition’s title, Earthly Bodies Born of Love, feels very different from that industrial, data-economy framing. Did you know the title beforehand?TTD: No, I didn’t. I really like the title; it’s very poetic. It comes from one of Petra Hermanova’s song titles, and she performed at the opening, and it influenced the curators and the whole exhibition. NM: What was installing the piece actually like?TTD: Those old industry buildings have a special kind of rawness. It was freezing when I installed, although it was a sunny spring week. But it was completely quiet except for some birds that had moved in during winter. And I think that exhibiting there makes a big difference – showing something that’s not just in a white cube, that comes with its own history. ‘Beyond Signals II’ Photographer:Mattias Lindbäck NM: This body of work has now travelled through several different spaces: Helsinki, Liljevalchs, Avesta Art. Are they a continuation or separate works in dialogue?TTD: I see them as chapters, but not as a linear progression. Some installations grow out of the previous one. I like to return to it and discover new layers. The Lings are a continuation of a sculpture I made called Hakili the Hare, which has been nominated for the High Line Plinth in New York. It is a public competition for the 2029–2030 commissions, and the selected work will be on view to about eight million visitors. NM: If we could go back to the beginning – where do you think this need to collect things comes from?Theresa Traore Dahlberg: I think it all begins with curiosity. As a child, I was fascinated by the shape and texture of things. Today, that curiosity often begins with a material. Take the cotton I’m working with now; I’m interested not only in its history, but also in the people who have worked with it and the lives it has passed through. It becomes a way of exploring together with the material itself. What first appears to be a simple material gradually reveals layers of history, politics, and personal stories. My practice is driven as much by curiosity as by intention. I rarely know where a work will end up; instead, I follow the material and the
