Steinunn Knúts Önnudóttir's courage is unmistakable. She left her position as dean of Performing Arts Department at Iceland University of the Arts, moved to Sweden and became a doctoral student at the Theatre Academy and the Agenda 2030 Graduate School. In her first semester, she also developed two performances while carrying out her duties as dean.
It was a challenge for her to go from an experienced, secure position and context to suddenly becoming a beginner again. But Steinunn Knúts Önnudóttir wanted time to reflect on what she was doing:
‘In my previous roles it was easy to get stuck in the production loop, where there wasn't the same space for reflection and where you were always judged by your last project. So leaving that and going into artistic research, free from audience figures and what is commercially relevant, was a real and long-awaited change.‘
Sustainable performance methods
Now Steinunn Knúts Önnudóttir is defending her PhD thesis 'How Little Is Enough? Sustainable performance methods for transformative encounters'. She has been researching sustainable methods for creating transformative encounters with audiences through participatory and site-specific performances, a format she now calls relation-specific performances.
Her interest in the subject - artistic exploration combined with sustainability and minimalism - was already there. Steinunn had founded the progressive theatre company The Professional Amateurs in Iceland in 2005. It was an experimental theatre in which she and her colleagues explored what happens when money is taken out of the theatre equation. The company ran for 10 years without traditional project funding or ticket sales.
And when she defends her thesis on Friday, it will not be in the usual form of a printed book. Instead, Steinunn will present a performance and an exhibition that will also be part of Malmö's Gallery Weekend.
The use of different forms of expression has been a hallmark of Steinunn's doctoral studies at Lund University. She has experimented with podcast interviews, created four performance works and several video articles. Steinunn Knúts Önnudóttir wants to reach a wider audience, including colleagues in her home country of Iceland, where artistic research is still a new field.
‘I wanted to create something they'd take to heart and use a language that both artists and scholars could relate to,‘ she says.
‘We want to save this planet‘
A central concept in Steinunn's research is existential sustainability. For her, this means creating a space where people can return to themselves and reflect on their values and relationships with the world. At the same time, she strives to minimise production and adopt environmentally sustainable practices. Together, these two elements aim to make the creative process both personally satisfying and ecologically responsible.
‘We need to realise that we want to save this planet, but the motivation should not come from fear, but from love and affection.‘
And that brings us to the core question: how little is enough? There's no clear answer, but Steinunn says it takes very small resources to make big changes.
Now that Steinunn is completing her PhD, she is looking forward to taking her experiences back to Iceland, where she plans to set up a creative centre in the countryside.
‘I want to continue working with existential sustainability and create experiences that help people connect with nature and the world around them,’ she says.
Read more about Steinunn's research in an article on Inter Art Centre's website - lu.se