SCRYPTH is an online journal, a platform for contemporary interdisciplinary Nordic artists, and an international community for new discussions around creative practice. It is a pioneering showcase promoting the work of visual artists and experimental writers from the Nordic countries and aims at no less than to establish an innovative, modern, and unique take on the relationship between writing and the visual arts. It is built on the traditions set forward by the post-war avantgarde, exploring the visual character of the written; from concrete and collage poetry introducing visual aesthetics in literature, to abstract expressionism moving the line between writing and drawing, and an exploration of semantics connecting literature and visual art to anthropology and neurology. It’s mission is to uncover the relationship between these concerns and the artistic and literary responses they inspire in the Nordic nations.

This stems from a desire to build a core in the Nordic region for the creative connection between the literary and the visual which has been crucial to the development of Nordic literature. It sets out to bridge the gap between visual art and literature, presenting work that demonstrates the tensions and possibilities of visual art and writing. Its focus is to establish a new discourse around the consequences of this, exemplified by the artistic practice of writers and artists, and their approaches to the challenges it poses. 

The selected contributors all come from the Nordic countries: Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, and Iceland. The work represents the most contemporary work made in the Nordic region in the traditions of asemic writing, concrete poetry, visual poetry, language inspired visual arts, and other practices exploring visual language. It is intended to be a space for interdisciplinary exploration as well as a comprehensive compendium of contemporary practitioners and their work.

We are motivated by conceptual interest in language, by voices on the margins, the multicultural and the neurodiverse, rather than discipline or methodology. Our purpose is to open up a more dynamic discussion around the possibilities and consequences of language as visual representation. At what point does a mark become a sign, and at what point does a sign become writing? How does the written live on the page, or the canvas, or the screen? What happens at the junction where writing ends and art begins? What is the visual quality of language?

Founded and curated by Vilde Bjerke Torset
www.vildebjerketorset.com