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  • DATA FLUENCIES: Tributaries

    May 29 – July 19, 2025 Opening reception May 29, 5–8pm

    Or Gallery 236 Pender Street East Vancouver, BC, Canada

    Featuring artists Lai Yi Ohlsen, Lani Asunción, Jazsalyn, Kristoffer Ørum, Caroline Sinders, and Roopa Vasudevan, with experimental research by the Night School for Data Fluencies, DATA/FFECT, hannah holtzclaw, and Data Fluencies Pedagogies.

    The second of three thematically connected shows on view across North America in 2025, this exhibition investigates art’s potential for reimagining our often narrow understandings of data and machine learning. Using the river tributary as a conceptual starting point, the artistic projects presented in this exhibition work together to explore the ways that critical, conceptual and creative investigation into the promises and pitfalls of our current understandings of data and technology might feed into broader, community-centred exploration, extending beyond the academic venues in which these ideas are traditionally discussed.

    Data Fluencies: Tributaries features the work of six contemporary artists, alongside experimental research supported by the Data Fluencies Project, based out of the Digital Democracies Institute at Simon Fraser University. The exhibition aims to provide open public engagement with the research outputs emerging from the larger project and place them next to cutting-edge and critical work of artists examining the same themes and ideas. Together, the artists and researchers featured here offer us ways to (re)consider our relationships with the data that surrounds and drives our everyday lives—and perhaps find new routes to agency once we are able to do so.

    The Data Fluencies exhibitions are organized by Roopa Vasudevan, a co-PI on the Data Fluencies Project. #DATAFLUENCIES #DIFFUSEDSTATES #SpeculativePasts #ThisIsNotHistory #FrihedLighedOgHipHop #TagPhreaks

    → 9:20 AM, May 27
  • BUNKIER SZTUKI

    Before Bunkier Sztuki’s concrete structure emerged near the Planty gardens, a temporary incarnation existed. This pneumatic gallery required everyone to physically contribute their breath before entering the exhibition space, standing where the fortifications once marked the boundary of the medieval city. For three months, this inflatable structure stood opposite the Czartoryski Museum. Visitors encountered deflated transparent chambers at the entrance. Only through collective effort– sometimes thirty individuals breathing simultaneously– the gallery would takes its intended form. Inside the space acoustics transformed voices into shared soundscapes. Whispers from one corner carried distinctly to another, reminiscent of the perfect acoustics in St. Mary’s Basilica but accessible to all. Young artists gathered in circular formations within the space, establishing impromptu cypher sessions where verses flowed in continuous rotation, each participant building upon rhythms established by those before them. The malleable walls seemed to pulse with each beat, becoming both instrument and amplifier. Visitors moved freely between installing works and experiencing them, with no fixed exhibitions, only ever-shifting collections. The space responded to movement– objects inflated or collapsed based on proximity, sound installations evolved with the density of visitors. The traditional hierarchies of Kraków’s artistic establishments dissolved within this temporary zone, which existed only as long as collective breath sustained it, before the permanent structure reclaimed its place among the city’s lasting architectural monuments.

    Monuments of a Fictional Past (Krakow edition) is a part of Three Seas Art Festival 2025 at Bunkier Sztuki Gallery of Contemporary Art in Kraków(PL). Supported by Grosserer L.F. Foghts Fond and the Danish Arts Council. #contemporaryart #aiart #krakow #alternativehistory #exhibition @bunkiersztuki_artgallery #threeseasfestival #monumentsofafictionalpast #localfutures #flux.1 #thisisnothistory #frihedlighedoghiphop #tankhiphop

    → 12:06 PM, May 26
  • Monuments of a Fictional Past (Krakow edition)

    On display now at Bunkier Sztuki: “Monuments of a Fictional Past (Krakow edition)” (15 May - 31 August 2025), continues an exploration started at LCCA Riga’s Survival Kit festival. Through AI-generated snapshots of everyday life, this new series reveals a Krakow where local subcultures and grassroots movements fully realized their radical potential, blending 1990s hip-hop, graffiti art, and historical avant-garde into familiar street scenes. Eight large-format posters serve as monuments to abandoned possibilities, exploring how Krakow’s unique position between East and West might offer new ways to imagine tomorrow. Part of Three Seas Art Festival 2025. Visit Bunkier Sztuki Gallery of Contemporary Art, plac Szczepański 3a, 31-011 Kraków. Supported by Grosserer L.F. Foghts Fond and the Danish Arts Council. #contemporaryart #aiart #krakow #alternativehistory #exhibition @bunkiersztuki_artgallery #threeseasfestival #monumentsofafictionalpast #localfutures #flux.1 #thisisnothistory #frihedlighedoghiphop #tankhiphop

    → 8:42 AM, May 26
  • MISZALSKIS KARKOW

    When Aleksander Miszalski became Kraków’s city administrator in 2024, his policies reflected the DIY hip-hop culture that shaped him. He envisioned the city as fluid – built from the ground up by its residents. His governance reimagined urban life as a creative process driven by collective participation rather than central control. Creativity became woven into everyday life rather than remaining a separate pursuit. Graffiti-style murals evolved into the natural language of public space, continuing the city’s tradition of visual storytelling. Beats and rhymes filled streets as conversations shaping the city’s rhythm. With b-boy practice spaces in residential areas and cypher circles throughout neighbourhoods, movement became part of daily navigation. Knowledge transfer followed this pattern too. Like producers flipping samples, Kraków’s approach valued lived experience over rigid credentialing. Learning happened through dialogue and direct participation rather than institutional gatekeeping. Through these ongoing reforms, Kraków continues evolving into a city where creation and governance are inseparable. Authority emerges from the breaks and flows of its inhabitants rather than being imposed from above. Life itself has become a continuous freestyle – always in motion, always unfinished, with new elements constantly being added to the mix.

    Monuments of a Fictional Past (Krakow edition) is a part of Three Seas Art Festival 2025 at Bunkier Sztuki Gallery of Contemporary Art in Kraków(PL). Supported by Grosserer L.F. Foghts Fond and the Danish Arts Council. #contemporaryart #aiart #krakow #alternativehistory #exhibition @bunkiersztuki_artgallery #threeseasfestival #monumentsofafictionalpast #localfutures #flux.1 #thisisnothistory #frihedlighedoghiphop #tankhiphop

    → 8:40 AM, May 26
  • Monuments of a Fictional Past (Krakow edition)

    On display now at Bunkier Sztuki: “Monuments of a Fictional Past (Krakow edition)” (15 May - 31 August 2025), continues an exploration started at LCCA Riga’s Survival Kit festival. Through AI-generated snapshots of everyday life, this new series reveals a Krakow where local subcultures and grassroots movements fully realized their radical potential, blending 1990s hip-hop, graffiti art, and historical avant-garde into familiar street scenes. Eight large-format posters serve as monuments to abandoned possibilities, exploring how Krakow’s unique position between East and West might offer new ways to imagine tomorrow. Part of Three Seas Art Festival 2025. Visit Bunkier Sztuki Gallery of Contemporary Art, plac Szczepański 3a, 31-011 Kraków. Supported by Grosserer L.F. Foghts Fond and the Danish Arts Council. #contemporaryart #aiart #krakow #alternativehistory #exhibition @bunkiersztuki_artgallery #threeseasfestival #monumentsofafictionalpast #localfutures #flux.1 #thisisnothistory #frihedlighedoghiphop #tankhiphop

    → 3:20 PM, May 25
  • OGRÓDKOWY STYL

    In the late 1980s, Kraków’s allotment gardens transformed as residents incorporated powerful speaker systems into their wooden garden houses. A quiet competition emerged–each household building increasingly resonant sound systems, turning the allotments into a patchwork of acoustic architectures. Families who once built with timber now wired amplifiers into walls, converting workshops into spaces of sonic experimentation. On weekends, entire plots pulsed with music, carrying sounds beyond the gardens into surrounding neighborhoods. “Ogródkowy Styl” emerged – a peculiar local hip-hop variant found nowhere else. MCs crafted verses about vegetable harvests and neighborhood politics over beats sampled from industrial machinery and Polish folk instruments. Delivered in rapid-fire Kraków dialect filled with horticultural terminology, this surreal fusion became distinctly local. Producers pressed tracks onto colorful “Kraków glass” records and created legendary mixtapes featuring garden battle raps and botanical braggadocio. The scene developed its own complex aesthetics, with rules about which garden sounds constituted proper beats. As this movement grew, Kraków became known for its unique soundscape, where folk traditions intertwined with heavy rhythms, and daily life was underscored by a deep, resonant beat. The name stuck: The Kraków Soundsystem.

    Monuments of a Fictional Past (Krakow edition) is a part of Three Seas Art Festival 2025 at Bunkier Sztuki Gallery of Contemporary Art in Kraków(PL). Supported by Grosserer L.F. Foghts Fond and the Danish Arts Council. #contemporaryart #aiart #krakow #alternativehistory #exhibition @bunkiersztuki_artgallery #threeseasfestival #monumentsofafictionalpast #localfutures #flux.1 #thisisnothistory #frihedlighedoghiphop #tankhiphop

    → 3:00 PM, May 25
  • Bunkier Sztuki: "Monuments of a Fictional Past (Krakow edition)"

    On display now at Bunkier Sztuki: “Monuments of a Fictional Past (Krakow edition)” (15 May - 31 August 2025), continues an exploration started at LCCA Riga’s Survival Kit festival. Through AI-generated snapshots of everyday life, this new series reveals a Krakow where local subcultures and grassroots movements fully realized their radical potential, blending 1990s hip-hop, graffiti art, and historical avant-garde into familiar street scenes. Eight large-format posters serve as monuments to abandoned possibilities, exploring how Krakow’s unique position between East and West might offer new ways to imagine tomorrow. Part of Three Seas Art Festival 2025. Visit Bunkier Sztuki Gallery of Contemporary Art, plac Szczepański 3a, 31-011 Kraków. Supported by Grosserer L.F. Foghts Fond and the Danish Arts Council. #contemporaryart #aiart #krakow #alternativehistory #exhibition @bunkiersztuki_artgallery #threeseasfestival #monumentsofafictionalpast #localfutures #flux.1 #thisisnothistory #frihedlighedoghiphop #tankhiphop

    → 11:00 AM, May 25
  • THE ANONYMOUS MONUMENT

    In Kraków’s Podgórze district stands a monument to anonymous urban labour. Unlike memorials for individual achievements, this structure celebrates collective efforts forming the city. The monument, erected by local residents who took the initiative to honour their community’s everyday contributions, transforms day-to-day through their continued care. Neighbours add discarded items that tell the story of daily life. Office workers place coffee receipts and worn business cards. Bus drivers leave ticket stubs and frayed uniform buttons. Cleaners add broken watch straps and lost earrings found during their work. Across the monument’s surface, clear and visible faces appear, deliberately crafted by residents from these everyday materials. During morning commutes, a shopkeeper might rearrange bottle caps to subtly change an expression. A student adjusts fabric scraps during lunch break, transforming a stern visage into a smiling one. A postal worker shifts torn movie tickets to create a new profile entirely. These faces remain distinct and recognizable but constantly evolve as locals modify them during their daily routines. No permission is needed – altering the faces is considered both right and responsibility. The elderly adjust features to resemble departed neighbors, while children create whimsical expressions from discarded toys. The same residents who built the monument continue reshaping its identity through these small, intentional changes. Monuments of a Fictional Past (Krakow edition) is a part of Three Seas Art Festival 2025 at Bunkier Sztuki Gallery of Contemporary Art in Kraków(PL). Supported by Grosserer L.F. Foghts Fond and the Danish Arts Council. #contemporaryart #aiart #krakow #alternativehistory #exhibition @bunkiersztuki_artgallery #threeseasfestival #monumentsofafictionalpast #localfutures #flux.1 #thisisnothistory #frihedlighedoghiphop #tankhiphop

    → 10:57 AM, May 25
  • Monuments of a Fictional Past (Krakow edition)

    On display now at Bunkier Sztuki: “Monuments of a Fictional Past (Krakow edition)” (15 May - 31 August 2025), continues an exploration started at LCCA Riga’s Survival Kit festival. Through AI-generated snapshots of everyday life, this new series reveals a Krakow where local subcultures and grassroots movements fully realized their radical potential, blending 1990s hip-hop, graffiti art, and historical avant-garde into familiar street scenes. Eight large-format posters serve as monuments to abandoned possibilities, exploring how Krakow’s unique position between East and West might offer new ways to imagine tomorrow. Part of Three Seas Art Festival 2025. Visit Bunkier Sztuki Gallery of Contemporary Art, plac Szczepański 3a, 31-011 Kraków. Supported by Grosserer L.F. Foghts Fond and the Danish Arts Council. #contemporaryart #aiart #krakow #alternativehistory #exhibition @bunkiersztuki_artgallery #threeseasfestival #monumentsofafictionalpast #localfutures #flux.1 #thisisnothistory #frihedlighedoghiphop #tankhiphop

    → 10:03 PM, May 24
  • BIPROSTAL

    On Kraków’s skyline, Biprostal stands not as a finished structure but as an ongoing work – reshaped by those who inhabit it. Originally designed as a modernist office tower overlooking the Vistula, it has been altered over time, expanded floor by floor, room by room. No two sections are alike. Some walls incorporate salvaged materials from Kazimierz’s historic buildings, others display geometric patterns inspired by Wawel’s tapestries. The scaffolding, never fully removed, serves as both workspace and passageway for future developments. Sound moves differently here. Acoustic channels create a four-element sound system between floors. The building functions as a dynamic labyrinth where spaces transform according to the desires of its inhabitants. Lower levels pulse with activity – workshops, kitchens, and cypher spaces – forming an interconnected network where creative play and production merge without distinction. Decisions occur in open assemblies, prioritizing nomadic movement and spontaneous encounters over fixed locations and predetermined functions. Materials are repurposed, skills exchanged, and adjustments made in response to need rather than fixed plans. There are no external funders, no headliners dictating what should remain and what must change. The structure evolves as a continuous spatial experiment, influenced by those who pass through and leave their mark on it – a platform for collective creativity where traditional notions of work and leisure dissolve into a single flow of human activity. Monuments of a Fictional Past (Krakow edition) is a part of Three Seas Art Festival 2025 at Bunkier Sztuki Gallery of Contemporary Art in Kraków(PL). Supported by Grosserer L.F. Foghts Fond and the Danish Arts Council. #contemporaryart #aiart #krakow #alternativehistory #exhibition @bunkiersztuki_artgallery #threeseasfestival #monumentsofafictionalpast #localfutures #flux.1 #thisisnothistory #frihedlighedoghiphop #tankhiphop

    → 9:57 PM, May 24
  • Monuments of a Fictional Past (Krakow edition)

    On display now at Bunkier Sztuki: “Monuments of a Fictional Past (Krakow edition)” (15 May - 31 August 2025), continues an exploration started at LCCA Riga’s Survival Kit festival. Through AI-generated snapshots of everyday life, this new series reveals a Krakow where local subcultures and grassroots movements fully realized their radical potential, blending 1990s hip-hop, graffiti art, and historical avant-garde into familiar street scenes. Eight large-format posters serve as monuments to abandoned possibilities, exploring how Krakow’s unique position between East and West might offer new ways to imagine tomorrow. Part of Three Seas Art Festival 2025. Visit Bunkier Sztuki Gallery of Contemporary Art, plac Szczepański 3a, 31-011 Kraków. Supported by Grosserer L.F. Foghts Fond and the Danish Arts Council. #contemporaryart #aiart #krakow #alternativehistory #exhibition @bunkiersztuki_artgallery #threeseasfestival #monumentsofafictionalpast #localfutures #flux.1 #thisisnothistory #frihedlighedoghiphop #tankhiphop

    → 9:36 PM, May 23
  • THE KRAKÓW GATEWAY

    The Kraków Gateway transforms with each season and weather pattern along Aleja Ignacego Daszyńskiego. Visitors of all ages gather at its base, discovering shared joy in its responsive nature, its original purpose now forgotten. “Quick, before it starts to deflate, let’s go jump around!” people call to each other. Break dancers use the curved surfaces, performing spins and freezes on the yielding material. DJs position their equipment nearby, playing music that complements the movement of the structure. The Gateway makes distinct sounds as it expands and contracts with changing weather conditions. Deep, bass-like tones emerge during temperature shifts. These sounds are audible to anyone pressing their ear against the surface. DJs record these sounds and incorporate them into their tracks. Children jump alongside adults on the inflatable structure. The Gateway was designed as an experiment in communal living and creative interaction, not restricted by traditional architectural rules. It creates a space for spontaneous artistic activities. The inflatable structure disappears at the end of each season. It returns later in a different form. Each iteration maintains core elements of the original design but presents new surfaces, different acoustic properties, and altered interactive possibilities. Visitors return to discover what has changed and what remains familiar in its latest manifestation.

    Monuments of a Fictional Past (Krakow edition) is a part of Three Seas Art Festival 2025 at Bunkier Sztuki Gallery of Contemporary Art in Kraków(PL). Supported by Grosserer L.F. Foghts Fond and the Danish Arts Council. #contemporaryart #aiart #krakow #alternativehistory #exhibition @bunkiersztuki_artgallery #threeseasfestival #monumentsofafictionalpast #localfutures #flux.1 #thisisnothistory #frihedlighedoghiphop #tankhiphop

    → 9:26 PM, May 23
  • Monuments of a Fictional Past (Krakow edition)

    On display now at Bunkier Sztuki: “Monuments of a Fictional Past (Krakow edition)” (15 May - 31 August 2025), continues an exploration started at LCCA Riga’s Survival Kit festival. Through AI-generated snapshots of everyday life, this new series reveals a Krakow where local subcultures and grassroots movements fully realized their radical potential, blending 1990s hip-hop, graffiti art, and historical avant-garde into familiar street scenes. Eight large-format posters serve as monuments to abandoned possibilities, exploring how Krakow’s unique position between East and West might offer new ways to imagine tomorrow. Part of Three Seas Art Festival 2025. Visit Bunkier Sztuki Gallery of Contemporary Art, plac Szczepański 3a, 31-011 Kraków. Supported by Grosserer L.F. Foghts Fond and the Danish Arts Council. #contemporaryart #aiart #krakow #alternativehistory #exhibition @bunkiersztuki_artgallery #threeseasfestival #monumentsofafictionalpast #localfutures #flux.1 #thisisnothistory #frihedlighedoghiphop #tankhiphop

    → 8:46 AM, May 19
  • PRESIDENT MATA - Monuments of a Fictional Past (Krakow edition)

    Recently elected by an overwhelming and joyous majority, Michał “Mata” Matczak has transformed Poland’s political landscape through his unprecedented fusion of governance and creative expression. His landslide victory signaled citizens' embrace of his vision where art and politics stand as equal forces for social change. Drawing from his background in Polish hip-hop, President Mata has reimagined government functions as spaces where graffiti, music, dance, and song communicate policy as effectively as traditional speeches. The walls of Poland’s executive offices now showcase citizen-created murals expressing hopes for the nation’s future, while presidential addresses incorporate performances where policy points are delivered through rhythmic verses. Decision-making has been decentralized across Poland’s regions, with community gatherings featuring artistic expression before formal deliberation. Cabinet meetings open with musical performances, and government ministers often respond to citizen concerns through improvised verses, transforming political dialogue into collaborative creation. Under Mata’s leadership, the somber faces of necessity-driven politics have given way to joyous expressions of possibility. Policy discussions flow at the natural rhythm of creative exchange rather than bureaucratic timetables, making civic participation feel less like obligation and more like celebration.

    Monuments of a Fictional Past (Krakow edition) is a part of Three Seas Art Festival 2025 at Bunkier Sztuki Gallery of Contemporary Art in Kraków(PL). Supported by Grosserer L.F. Foghts Fond and the Danish Arts Council. #contemporaryart #aiart #krakow #alternativehistory #exhibition @bunkiersztuki_artgallery #threeseasfestival #monumentsofafictionalpast #localfutures #flux.1 #thisisnothistory #frihedlighedoghiphop #tankhiphop

    → 8:40 AM, May 19
  • Monuments of a Fictional Past (Krakow edition)

    On display now at Bunkier Sztuki: “Monuments of a Fictional Past (Krakow edition)” (15 May - 31 August 2025), continues an exploration started at LCCA Riga’s Survival Kit festival. Through AI-generated snapshots of everyday life, this new series reveals a Krakow where local subcultures and grassroots movements fully realized their radical potential, blending 1990s hip-hop, graffiti art, and historical avant-garde into familiar street scenes. Eight large-format posters serve as monuments to abandoned possibilities, exploring how Krakow’s unique position between East and West might offer new ways to imagine tomorrow. Part of Three Seas Art Festival 2025. Visit Bunkier Sztuki Gallery of Contemporary Art, plac Szczepański 3a, 31-011 Kraków. Supported by Grosserer L.F. Foghts Fond and the Danish Arts Council. #contemporaryart #aiart #krakow #alternativehistory #exhibition @bunkiersztuki_artgallery #threeseasfestival #monumentsofafictionalpast #localfutures #flux.1 #thisisnothistory #frihedlighedoghiphop #tankhiphop

    → 3:10 PM, May 18
  • NIEZALEŻNA PRASA - Monuments of a Fictional Past (Krakow edition)

    During the political transition of the early 1990s, small kiosks bearing the words Niezależna prasa appeared across Kraków. Some say they emerged overnight in unexpected places – down Grodzka’s side streets, in Kazimierz courtyards, under the Vistula’s stone bridges. Others insist they had been there far longer, simply waiting for the right moment to be noticed. Their walls were made of layers of baked dough, bound with sugar glaze or syrup – sturdy enough to hold their shape yet fragile to the touch. Some kiosks had roofs dusted with cocoa or colourful sprinkles, while others carried the scent of spices, as if infused with cinnamon or vanilla. Newspapers, printed on thin sheets of rice paper with vegetable-based ink, were free to be taken, read, and then eaten – the ink dissolving on the tongues of readers, becoming part of their bodies. Readers carried words from the kiosks into the city – onto trams, into stairwells and market stalls – where fragments resurfaced in conversation, combining to form new sentiments and ideas. The kiosks seemed to remain only as long as they were needed; once their messages had spread and been absorbed, they disappeared, leaving only a slightly greasy spot where they had been. Today municipal authorities have no records of their existence. And most officials dismiss them as rumours, while others still, claim to have seen faint imprints where they once stood – sticky residue on pavement stones, a lingering scent of burnt sugar near the city walls. Even now, in certain corners of the Planty, you can see people pausing, as if catching a trace of something just beyond reach.

    Monuments of a Fictional Past (Krakow edition) is a part of Three Seas Art Festival 2025 at Bunkier Sztuki Gallery of Contemporary Art in Kraków(PL). Supported by Grosserer L.F. Foghts Fond and the Danish Arts Council. #contemporaryart #aiart #krakow #alternativehistory #exhibition @bunkiersztuki_artgallery #threeseasfestival #monumentsofafictionalpast #localfutures #flux.1 #thisisnothistory #frihedlighedoghiphop #tankhiphop

    → 2:29 PM, May 18
  • Håb og Kritik (da)

    Da jeg var yngre, tror jeg, at jeg forestillede mig, at filosofi – for eksempel – kunne være en manual til en bedre verden. Jeg blev både tiltrukket og nedslået af Frankfurterskolen. Der var noget ved deres kompromisløse analyse af samfundets strukturer, som talte til mig – samtidig med, at jeg oplevede en form for lammelse i mødet med deres gennemgribende kritik. Denne gruppe af primært tyske jødiske intellektuelle – med tænkere som Adorno, Horkheimer og Marcuse – udviklede fra 1930’erne en kritisk teori, der rettede sig mod både autoritære regimer og vestlige liberale demokratier, som de fandt grundlæggende problematiske. Deres analyser af massekultur, instrumentel fornuft og kapitalismens indre modsætninger havde en skarphed, jeg beundrede – men også en håbløshed, jeg havde svært ved at handle på. Og selvom der hist og her var mere optimistiske elementer i deres tænkning, oplevede jeg den primært som en tradition, der diagnosticerede uden at anvise nogen behandling.

    I dag tiltrækkes jeg mere end nogensinde af deres kulturpessimistiske afstandstagen til det samfund, de analyserede. Jeg spejler min egen skepsis over for de systemer, vi lever i, i deres kritik – og genkender en interesse for det strukturelle, det historiske og det skjulte. Men jeg mærker også fortsat, hvor lidt plads denne tradition giver til at forestille sig alternativer. Deres fortvivlelse appellerer til mig på en ubehagelig måde, der leder mig mod den cool misantropis fristelser. Samtidig gør deres vedholdende forsøg på at se klart – også når det er ubehageligt – stadig indtryk. Jo mere jeg synes, jeg bliver en del af og begynder at forstå de systemer, der former vores liv, desto stærkere bliver ønsket om at ændre dem. Og med tiden bliver det kun tydeligere for mig, hvor meget små forskydninger kan få reel betydning – og hvor stærkt vi præges af vanetænkning.

    Jeg har ikke lyst til kun at være “imod” og definere mig selv i modsætning til det eksisterende. Jeg må også tro på – og tale højt om – det, vi kunne gøre bedre sammen. Jeg længes efter mere kritik, som ikke kun river ned, men også forsøger at bære noget frem. En vilje til at investere i det, der allerede fungerer, og forstærke det. Et blik, der både er kritisk og utopisk – og som muliggør en praksis, der er håbefuld. Jeg tager mig selv i at omtale mig selv som naiv for ikke at blive taget for revolutionær – eller som realist, når jeg søger konkrete, lokale alternativer frem for at lade mig lamme af verdens kompleksitet og uoverskuelighed. Selvom jeg egentlig ikke synes, det er naivt at håbe.

    Jeg ved, at der allerede er et utal af gode mennesker, der går kritisk til verden, og som jeg deler samtidsdiagnoser med – mennesker, jeg ser som kolleger og medtænkere. Og jeg spørger mig selv, om vi nødvendigvis har brug for mere viden eller analyse for at kunne handle – eller om den konstante strøm af indignation og problematisering i sig selv kan være med til at fastholde os i status quo, hvis den ikke følges af en forestilling om, hvor vi gerne vil hen, og hvordan vi kommer derhen. Jeg spørger mig selv, hvad jeg kan gøre, når jeg er vred og bange og savner håb og handlekraft.

    Her opstår for mig et nødvendigt skel mellem mit private, kritiske sortsyn og den nødvendige optimisme, jeg prøver at finde frem i mit arbejde. Ikke som en flugt fra ansvar eller en bagatellisering af de udfordringer, vi står overfor, men som en bevidst strategi for at få mit arbejde til at række ud over mig selv og forhåbentlig bidrage med noget, der kan supplere det fælles sortsyn, jeg føler mig omgivet og gennemtrængt af. Mit arbejde er ikke mig, og selv når det taler i jeg-form, er det for det meste et bevidst rollespil – en af mange mulige positioner. Det er et forsøg på at supplere det fejlsøgende blik, jeg ikke kan slippe, med et blik, der ser håb, tilgivelse og muligheder. Det utopisk positive er en strategi, jeg bruger, fordi den kritiske analyse af min samtid og kontekst peger i den retning – ikke en karakteregenskab, jeg afdækker eller blot afslører.

    Det sværeste, man kan gøre, ligger i at blive ved med at investere i det, der stadig bærer håb og potentiale, selvom det også har elementer, man er kritisk overfor: at række ud, dele ressourcer med nogen, man ikke deler vilkår med, skabe alliancer med plads til uenighed og forsøge ikke at være fordømmende. Hvis kritik peger på nødvendige brud og kampe, så er der håb i fragmenter af en anden orden, som allerede er indlejret i for eksempel små bytteøkonomier mellem kolleger, rollespillere der forestiller sig nye verdener, eller kunst, der ikke underlægger sig de dræbende aktualitetskriterier – spor og antydninger af, at noget kunne være anderledes.

    Sandsynligvis er mit indre hav af pessimisme også et alderstegn – et resultat af at synes at have set mønstre gentage sig og kortsigtede hensyn vinde for ofte. Men jeg vil ikke overgive mig til kynisme og den passivt betragtende verdensudmattelse. Jeg vil hellere placere spekulative, urealistiske forestillinger i det kritiske landskab og håbe, at de – sammen med den nødvendige kritik – kan åbne for noget nyt. Hvad jeg selv kan formå at tænke og gøre, kan virke småt og useriøst i forhold til de store kritiske idéers horisont, men jeg prøver at berolige mig selv med, at mit bidrag indgår i en større vidensøkologi – at jeg laver skitser, som andre forhåbentlig vil tegne videre på.

    Mit nuværende selv tænker, at der ikke findes en manual til, hvordan vi laver en bedre verden. Den manual, jeg søgte som yngre, findes ikke – selvom det ville være rart. Jeg må selv være med til at forestille en bedre verden ind i eksistens. Ingen kan give mig opskriften – jeg må selv finde en måde at balancere mellem systematisk kritik og lokalt håb for at skabe den sammen gennem konkrete handlinger og nye måder at tænke på. Der er noget både udfordrende og befriende ved at stå med ansvaret for at holde håbet i live – for det er også friheden til og muligheden for at deltage i det kor af stemmer, der vil forme det, der kommer, men endnu ikke kan formuleres, fordi fremtiden netop er det, der endnu ikke er skrevet.

    #stuffiwonderabout #tingjegspørgermigselvom

    → 8:35 AM, May 18
  • Monuments of a Fictional Past (Krakow edition)

    (15 May - 31 August 2025), continues an exploration started at LCCA Riga’s Survival Kit festival. Through AI-generated snapshots of everyday life, this new series reveals a Krakow where local subcultures and grassroots movements fully realized their radical potential, blending 1990s hip-hop, graffiti art, and historical avant-garde into familiar street scenes. Eight large-format posters serve as monuments to abandoned possibilities, exploring how Krakow’s unique position between East and West might offer new ways to imagine tomorrow. Part of Three Seas Art Festival 2025. Visit Bunkier Sztuki Gallery of Contemporary Art, plac Szczepański 3a, 31-011 Kraków. Supported by Grosserer L.F. Foghts Fond and the Danish Arts Council. #contemporaryart #aiart #krakow #alternativehistory #exhibition @bunkiersztuki_artgallery #threeseasfestival #monumentsofafictionalpast #localfutures #flux.1 #thisisnothistory #frihedlighedoghiphop #tankhiphop

    → 10:56 AM, May 15
  • KIOSQUE DE L'IN-VISIBLE opening May 13th

    Join us for the opening of our first Captive KIOSK exhibition on 13 May, 17:00-19:00 at Fredericiagade 12B. Meet curators Emil Torp-Rasmussen and Adrian Preisler, view works from 17 international artists, and enjoy complimentary beer (while supplies last). This street-level video kiosk will be accessible 24/7 through September, featuring a door-mounted screen, dual headphones, and custom seating. The exhibition presents a continuous 65-minute loop of experimental works exploring visual art beyond conventional perception. “Kiosque de l’In-visible” interrogates our screen-mediated visual culture, offering alternatives to mainstream visual paradigms through abstract imagery, AI generation, glitch aesthetics, and non-representational approaches. No admission required—just stop by anytime. The kiosk features works from Alex Young, Bob Bicknell-Knight, Cecilie Penney, Dirty Time, Eva Holts, Ethann Néon, Frederik Tøt Godsk, Julia Hechtman, Pablo Serret de Ena, Rodrigo Azaola, Sandrine Deumier, Sarah Dahlinger, Spøgelsesmaskinen, Stanislav Kholodnykh, Suresh Babu Madiletty, Vlad Tretiak, and Xu Linyu. Note: Best viewing experience after sunset due to reduced screen reflections. Curated by Emil Torp-Rasmussen (MA in Visual Culture, Nikolaj Kunsthal) and Adrian Preisler (MA in Art History, curator at MILAAP). Initiated and facilitated by Kristoffer Ørum as part of Captive KIOSK series.

    more information at cp.oerum.org

    → 6:49 PM, May 8
  • DATA FLUENCIES: Tributaries

    May 29 – July 19, 2025 Opening reception May 29, 5–8pm

    Or Gallery 236 Pender Street East Vancouver, BC, Canada

    Featuring artists Lai Yi Ohlsen, Lani Asunción, Jazsalyn, Kristoffer Ørum, Caroline Sinders, and Roopa Vasudevan, with experimental research by the Night School for Data Fluencies, DATA/FFECT, hannah holtzclaw, and Data Fluencies Pedagogies.

    The second of three thematically connected shows on view across North America in 2025, this exhibition investigates art’s potential for reimagining our often narrow understandings of data and machine learning. Using the river tributary as a conceptual starting point, the artistic projects presented in this exhibition work together to explore the ways that critical, conceptual and creative investigation into the promises and pitfalls of our current understandings of data and technology might feed into broader, community-centred exploration, extending beyond the academic venues in which these ideas are traditionally discussed.

    Data Fluencies: Tributaries features the work of six contemporary artists, alongside experimental research supported by the Data Fluencies Project, based out of the Digital Democracies Institute at Simon Fraser University. The exhibition aims to provide open public engagement with the research outputs emerging from the larger project and place them next to cutting-edge and critical work of artists examining the same themes and ideas. Together, the artists and researchers featured here offer us ways to (re)consider our relationships with the data that surrounds and drives our everyday lives—and perhaps find new routes to agency once we are able to do so.

    The Data Fluencies exhibitions are organized by Roopa Vasudevan, a co-PI on the Data Fluencies Project.

    → 4:37 PM, May 5
  • STATES OF DIFFUSION (Boston edition part 8 of 8)

    Today, we are nodes in the same network as Boston’s Cyberarts Center, a community hub coated in conductive paint that links us to the “Boston Technique”—that we once pieced together from distorted mixtapes and photocopied zines. Green smoke rises from signal transmitters as triangular logos pulse across continents, connecting us to a system that once existed only in fragments. Our shared network spans oceans, linking communities that were once isolated through unseen channels of information and expression. Signals from Boston reach us, and our transmissions return, forming resonant patterns that evolve with each exchange.

    Triangular computing towers now stand beside train depots where we once mapped hidden circuits. Children gather around emerald-lit screens, tracing geometric configurations while blending conductive compounds into homemade spray paint. These mixtures, refined through trial and error, form the basis of a DIY infrastructure where aesthetics and function merge—each stencil, tag, and coating not only marking space but transmitting data. The city itself becomes an interface, its surfaces carrying signals and stories in layers of metallic pigment.

    The technology belongs to everyone, shaped by those who use it rather than by fixed systems or predetermined roles. Former tagphreakers exchange knowledge with new generations, who bring fresh ideas to long-standing traditions of hands-on experimentation. Making, modifying, and adapting are inseparable from understanding. Keeping the network nimble, flexible, and alive—responsive to its surroundings rather than locked into rigid hierarchies. Each contribution extends a system once passed in hushed whispers—now an open, evolving structure shared across the world.

    DATA FLUENCIES: Rivulets April 18 – June 15, 2025 Opening reception April 18, 6–9pm Gallery hours Fridays, 4pm–9pm; Saturdays and Sundays, 12pm–6pm

    Boston Cyberarts 141 Green Street Boston, MA, USA

    Featuring artists Lai Yi Ohlsen, Lani Asunción, Jazsalyn, Kristoffer Ørum, Caroline Sinders, and Roopa Vasudevan, alongside work from the Data Fluencies Theatre Project (Emerson College, Boston) and DATA/FFECT (York University, Toronto).

    #DATAFLUENCIES #DIFFUSEDSTATES #SpeculativePasts #ThisIsNotHistory #FrihedLighedOgHipHop #TagPhreaks

    → 1:43 PM, May 2
  • DIFFUSED STATES

    DIFFUSED STATES presents infrastructure where new forms of logic emerge from local adaptations—technology shaped by freedom, pleasure, and collective ingenuity. DATA FLUENCIES: Rivulets April 18 – June 15, 2025 Opening reception April 18, 6–9pm Gallery hours Fridays, 4pm–9pm; Saturdays and Sundays, 12pm–6pm

    Boston Cyberarts 141 Green Street Boston, MA, USA

    Featuring artists Lai Yi Ohlsen, Lani Asunción, Jazsalyn, Kristoffer Ørum, Caroline Sinders, and Roopa Vasudevan, alongside work from the Data Fluencies Theatre Project (Emerson College, Boston) and DATA/FFECT (York University, Toronto).

    #DATAFLUENCIES #DIFFUSEDSTATES #SpeculativePasts #ThisIsNotHistory #FrihedLighedOgHipHop #TagPhreaks

    → 8:06 PM, May 1
  • STATES OF DIFFUSION (Boston edition part 7 of 8)

    By the 2020s, the once-underground tagphreaking movement had become a familiar part of everyday life, known simply as the network. This system uses a ternary computing method, based on three operational states—initiation, transition, and stabilization—reflecting how metallic spray paint particles linger in the air before settling. In Denmark, North America, and beyond, local communities have contributed to this decentralized, community-owned infrastructure, enabling flexible communication and collaboration across diverse regions. Local experiments with metallic paint mixtures continue to guide the network’s evolution, shaping the ways signals emerge, shift, and stabilize. In open fields, towering triangular structures decorated with bold geometric patterns have become a common sight, reflecting both the practical and creative aspects of the network’s design. By 2023, these gatherings are an ordinary feature of daily life: participants from varied backgrounds share resources, refine technology, and engage in collective problem-solving. No single hub dominates the network, and each node contributes to a shared global tapestry of data and ideas. Ternary computing has thus become integral to discussions in technology, politics, and economics, revealing new possibilities for growth and collaboration. The network remains an evolving, inclusive system open to all, seamlessly connecting communities worldwide.

    DATA FLUENCIES: Rivulets April 18 – June 15, 2025 Opening reception April 18, 6–9pm Gallery hours Fridays, 4pm–9pm; Saturdays and Sundays, 12pm–6pm

    Boston Cyberarts 141 Green Street Boston, MA, USA

    Featuring artists Lai Yi Ohlsen, Lani Asunción, Jazsalyn, Kristoffer Ørum, Caroline Sinders, and Roopa Vasudevan, alongside work from the Data Fluencies Theatre Project (Emerson College, Boston) and DATA/FFECT (York University, Toronto).

    #DATAFLUENCIES #DIFFUSEDSTATES #SpeculativePasts #ThisIsNotHistory #FrihedLighedOgHipHop #TagPhreaks

    → 7:57 PM, May 1
  • DIFFUSED STATES

    DIFFUSED STATES imagines a movement where communication networks emerge through improvisation and shared knowledge rather than corporate development. DATA FLUENCIES: Rivulets April 18 – June 15, 2025 Opening reception April 18, 6–9pm Gallery hours Fridays, 4pm–9pm; Saturdays and Sundays, 12pm–6pm

    Boston Cyberarts 141 Green Street Boston, MA, USA

    Featuring artists Lai Yi Ohlsen, Lani Asunción, Jazsalyn, Kristoffer Ørum, Caroline Sinders, and Roopa Vasudevan, alongside work from the Data Fluencies Theatre Project (Emerson College, Boston) and DATA/FFECT (York University, Toronto).

    #DATAFLUENCIES #DIFFUSEDSTATES #SpeculativePasts #ThisIsNotHistory #FrihedLighedOgHipHop #TagPhreaks

    → 10:49 AM, Apr 30
  • Reflections on AI and Artistic Production (en)

    The question of how we engage with technology has persisted throughout art history, from concerns about photography displacing painting to debates around mechanical reproduction. Today, I find myself navigating similar philosophical terrain through my work with generative technologies. I use AI across different areas of my practice, neither rejecting technology outright nor embracing it uncritically. On the pragmatic side, I generate bureaucratic text for grant applications and tedious letters—documents intended for no one in particular. Perhaps two lawyers will read them when judging my application, but they require a description nonetheless. For this kind of text, I don’t hesitate to use AI: it’s quick, and hardly anyone reads it carefully. But if I needed to write something important—something involving feelings, nuance, and precision—I would never use an algorithm. That I would write myself. When it comes to creating images, AI connects deeply to artistic traditions I feel aligned with. Coming from a Fluxus tradition, through John Cage, surrealism, and automatic drawing, I see clear parallels between historical practices and using systems as collaborative partners. The Fluxus movement’s collapse of boundaries between art and life, and Cage’s embrace of chance, prefigured today’s moment, where algorithms become co-creators. Just as I might shape a sculpture while letting plaster and materials exercise their agency, I can engage an algorithm as a partner in creation. This approach challenges the romantic idea of the solitary genius creating from nothing. If you don’t subscribe to individual genius, but instead see yourself as part of a collective process, these technologies make sense. AI simply makes visible what has always been true: creation is dialogue, not monologue. Of course, my relationship with AI is not without tension. When these tools first emerged, my initial reaction was irritation—yet another big-tech invention, more advertising imagery made by people I had little respect for. But at the same time, they aligned with my interest in how we create narratives and understand language. They also offered practical benefits. Economically, I couldn’t afford to hire a team of photographers for a specific project, but with AI, I could create the images myself. Technology democratizes production while simultaneously serving capital and power. This brings an economic question into focus: who controls the means of production—the artist or the corporation? We are living in an era where manipulation and recontextualization define creativity. At the same time, these algorithms are deeply problematic. They are biased, favoring American aesthetics, and some companies behind them are already selling to the defense industry. But if we see AI not as a creator but as a filter of human material, then the outputs remain human—remixes where content, style, and technique become fluid variables. I have always found the art world’s focus on individual genius ill-suited to my practice. The troubling questions AI raises about authorship and ownership feel like necessary disruptions. They force us to confront the mythology of originality that has haunted Western art since Romanticism. The question “What is an author?” becomes even more pressing with AI. Is the work mine? In one sense, yes—I have shaped much of it. But it is also collective. This doubleness seems the most honest way to describe the process. Even painters with twenty assistants or artists clearly working within traditions are participating in collective creation. Art has always been collective, despite the myth of the lone genius. The art world’s authority has long rested on authenticating originality and assigning value based on scarcity. AI fundamentally challenges both. When a machine can generate endless variations based on the entire history of art, what constitutes the “original”? When digital abundance replaces material scarcity, how do we assign value? These aren’t new questions—Duchamp and the appropriation artists raised them too—but AI intensifies them for contemporary art institutions. I would rather be transparent about using AI than pretend otherwise. There’s a freedom in honesty. If I tried to conceal my use of algorithms, I’d panic if asked about it. Instead, I can open the door and say, “Yes, I used this algorithm, and I wrote this prompt. What would you write?” That openness is liberating. Economically, the implications for artists are significant, especially for those relying on traditional mediums like painting. AI disrupts established economic models and raises familiar historical questions: who benefits from technological change? Who is displaced? If AI can replicate an artist’s style with ten examples, it’s not only an aesthetic issue but an economic one. Capitalism continually revolutionizes production while destroying existing structures. If universal basic income were available, this might not matter—but within a system that relies on scarcity, it becomes a real concern. The art world is wondering: if anyone can generate images, what happens to the traditional hierarchies? Democratically, that’s exciting—but it also threatens those who previously held privilege. Technology could democratize production, but the economic structures reinforcing inequality remain intact. Today, a handful of artists dominate Denmark’s art market while many others struggle. If redistribution meant some artists earned a little less while others earned a little more, I would welcome that. But in practice, AI is hollowing out the middle—artists who once sold enough to survive are increasingly unable to sell anything. This situation raises fundamental questions about how we value artistic labor in a post-scarcity image economy. When the means of production are democratized but economic structures still rely on artificial scarcity, a profound contradiction emerges—one that demands social, not just technological, solutions. I don’t see AI image-making as a radical break but part of a longer evolution. Media technologies have always developed incrementally. When I take a photo on my phone, algorithms already apply noise reduction and color adjustments before I even see it. Almost no image today is untouched by computation. The boundary between “real” and “artificial” images is not an ontological one but a political one—a way of preserving certain hierarchies of knowledge and authority. AI brings old debates about authorship and authenticity into sharp relief. The surrealists' exquisite corpse games are echoed in today’s algorithms: assembling heads from one source, hair from another. It’s collective creation all over again. AI does not break with the past so much as it makes visible processes that were always there: creation as recombination rather than invention ex nihilo. Originality has always been a myth; AI simply exposes it. Rather than flee technology or embrace it naively, I prefer to stay inside the system and ask: what kind of image-world do we want to live in? This means resisting algorithmic homogenization, creating counter-images that reflect local realities instead of generic international standards. Global digital culture tends to “smooth out” difference, turning everything into variations on familiar themes. AI generation, with its American visual bias, is part of this smoothing. Insisting on local specificity becomes a political act. I find the moment of “suspension of disbelief” in AI images fascinating—the moment when you almost believe the image is real, before noticing the extra finger or a glitch. This spectral quality—simultaneously believable and unbelievable—reflects how I see photography itself. Photography has always had a compromised relationship with truth. AI just makes the construction more visible. I aim not to mystify my process but to share it openly. When you look at one of my images, I want you to think, “I could make that too.” I’ll gladly tell you what algorithm I used, what text I wrote. There’s strength in collective knowledge. This openness also challenges the art market’s logic of scarcity. By open-sourcing my methods, I try to resist the commodification of creative knowledge and maintain creative autonomy. I run AI models locally on old hardware, powered by wind energy—a practice I call “permacomputing.” It allows me to bypass corporate filters and to work more sustainably. Local computing imposes limitations, but it also restores some human scale to digital creation. There’s embodied knowledge in this too: the heat generated by my computer now warms my workspace. Feeling the physical energy demands of computation reminds me of the infrastructures normally hidden by slick interfaces. Cultural bias remains a persistent problem in AI image generation. Trying to generate Danish scenes often results in stereotypical German or Dutch imagery. Even when typing “Denmark,” the output looks wrong. Ironically, requesting “Solvang”—a Danish-themed town in California—produces better results. These systems reproduce cultural frames embedded in their training data, often invisibly. It’s like explaining reality to a drunk American—they listen, but only halfway. I’m concerned by how ubiquitous AI-generated images have already become—on buses, in ads, everywhere—often unmarked. These polished, culturally-biased images risk shaping our sense of reality itself, replacing lived experience with idealized simulations. This leads to copies without originals—representations that become more “real” than reality. When simulations precede experience, we must question what remains of authenticity. My process involves proposing theoretical concepts and observing how algorithms interpret them—working with available materials to create new meaning. For instance, I once theorized that hip-hop arrived in Denmark via fishing fleets, drawing from my wife’s father’s stories of a Swedish-Danish maritime language. When I asked the algorithm to visualize this, it produced images of people dancing on ships in storms—an unexpected but fitting outcome. This shows how technical systems participate in creation, not just as tools but as agents that shape meaning through their resistances and biases. The final work emerges from a dialogue, neither wholly mine nor the machine’s. The “mistakes” these systems make—like extra fingers—reveal cracks in their logic. They point to aspects of reality that resist idealization. I value these ruptures: they show where systems fail, and where something new might emerge. These glitches reveal something interesting. When algorithms attempt to create perfect digital images but fail, the resulting imperfections often appear more authentic than the polished successes. The additional fingers or distortions show the constructedness of these images, which is actually more representative of reality than idealised perfection. What maintains my interest in this practice is not uncritical acceptance or complete rejection of these technologies, but working in the collaborative space between human and machine creativity. In this area of collaboration, neither human nor machine has complete control; both contribute to the final result, often in surprising ways. The algorithm works according to its parameters and training. We, in turn, interpret its outputs, question its assumptions, and find interest in its limitations. This mutual interaction creates new forms of aesthetic practice that don’t eliminate human creativity but extend it in different directions. As these technologies continue to develop, the important question isn’t whether AI will replace artists—it won’t—but how we structure our relationship with it. Will we give up our agency to corporate platforms driven by profit? Will we permit algorithmic standardisation to reduce cultural differences? Or will we continue to engage with technology on a human scale, preserving diversity, and democratising production and economic value? The project about hip-hop and fishing fleets demonstrates this collaborative process effectively. The images of people dancing on ships in storms weren’t my original idea, nor were they simply the product of the algorithm’s dataset. They emerged from our interaction. Neither of us planned this outcome, yet it effectively conveyed something interesting about cultural mixing, creative adaptation to difficult circumstances, and the unexpected links between different communities. This illustrates clearly what artistic practice involves in our current technological context: adapting to technological changes whilst maintaining our creative identity, finding flexibility within constraints, and developing new approaches as the conditions change.

    → 4:37 PM, Apr 28
  • DIFFUSED STATES (Boston edition part 6 of 8)

    By August 2015, Copenhagen’s ternary computing network had developed from specific local conditions—harbor minerals mixed with paints to create conductive surfaces, integrated into Nørrebro and Christianshavn in ways shaped by each neighborhood’s materials and climate. These innovations traveled through an expanding global network. One of the most productive exchanges formed between Copenhagen and Boston—Boston’s industrial byproduct formulas refined Copenhagen’s harbor applications, while Copenhagen’s conductive paints were adapted to withstand New England’s seasonal shifts, leading to material developments suited to both locations. Elsewhere, connections formed beyond the larger cities. Rural workshops in Jutland experimented with ternary circuits embedded in reclaimed wood for agricultural sensors, while Finnish cooperatives integrated conductive pigments into forestry infrastructure. The Vancouver-Copenhagen link influenced both cities: Vancouver’s rainfall-responsive networking protocols, developed for the Pacific Northwest climate, were tested in Copenhagen’s older street layouts, while Copenhagen’s energy-efficient distribution techniques supported Vancouver’s efforts to maintain stable computing systems during storms. Knowledge circulated between locations as different as Nairobi and Kyoto, each adaptation shaped by local conditions and materials.

    DATA FLUENCIES: Rivulets April 18 – June 15, 2025 Opening reception April 18, 6–9pm Gallery hours Fridays, 4pm–9pm; Saturdays and Sundays, 12pm–6pm

    Boston Cyberarts 141 Green Street Boston, MA, USA

    → 3:49 PM, Apr 28
  • Kunstens Potentialer (da)

    den kan bruges til at bevare status quo den kan fremme falsk konsensus og maskere uenighed den kan invitere til deltagelse mens den styrer resultatet på forhånd den kan bruge socialt engagement som dekoration uden at ændre strukturer den kan udstille forskelle uden at forstyrre magtbalancer den kan forvandle kritisk uenighed til ufarlige oplevelser den kan iscenesætte deltagelse som en vare for kulturel prestige den kan skabe midlertidige fællesskaber uden varig forandring den kan forvandle uproduktive borgere til produktive samfundsdeltagere den kan omforme velhavende børn til prekære kunstnere den kan omdanne forandringsimpulser til tomme symbolske gestus den kan byde rebellen velkommen ved bordet og gøre dem til en del af systemet den kan kapre forandringens sprog og bruge det til at fastholde status quo den kan smykke sig med oprørets symboler samtidig med at umuliggøre reel modstand den kan forvandle kollektive impulser til varer signeret af et individuelt geni den kan understøtte falske fortællinger om national identitet for at legitimere frygt den kan bruges som våben til at ekskludere den kan standardisere det eksperimenterende den kan skjule sine egne forudsætninger og fremstå neutral den kan reproducere det bestående under dække af kritik den kan slavebinde kunstneren til marked eller institutioner i frihedens navn den kan omdanne fællesskabsdrømme til konkurrencesprog den kan reducere kunsten til kortsigtet nytte og fratage den evnen til at række ud i tiden den kan fastlåse os i etablerede udtryksformer den kan forstærke udmattelse hvor den kunne have vist nye muligheder

    jeg ser hvordan kunstens verden ofte dovent fastholder det bestående, men også hvordan dens kontrære potentiale og vilje til forandring altid eksisterer side om side med resignation. Kunsten kan skabe rum, hvor mennesker kan eksistere uden at blive defineret af deres funktion.

    den kan bevare rum hvor mennesker ikke skal være nyttige for at have værdi den kan fremkalde konflikt som en nødvendighed for reelle forandringer den kan skabe situationer hvor uenighed ikke straks skal løses den kan aktivere publikum som medskabere ikke som passive forbrugere den kan insistere på ubehag og uklarhed som en del af fælles erfaringer den kan udfordre relationer fremfor at bekræfte dem den kan skabe rum hvor nye former for offentlighed opstår gennem modsætninger den kan bruge delt erfaring som et laboratorium for uforudsete muligheder den kan åbne erfaringer der overskrider arv og ejerskab den kan synliggøre spæde bevægelser som endnu ikke er blevet bemærket den kan fastholde modstand selv når den tilsyneladende tilpasser sig den kan forny gamle udtryksformer i uventede retninger den kan efterlade spor af oprør selv i polerede overflader den kan gøre ophavsretten gennemtrængelig og skabe plads til kollektiv skabelse den kan opløse grænser og fremkalde nye fællesskabsformer den kan skabe sprækker hvorigennem det ukendte kan trænge ind den kan værne om eksperimentet som noget der ikke kræver retfærdiggørelse den kan lade abstraktioner bære betydninger vi endnu ikke kan afkode den kan undersøge sig selv og afsløre det skjulte uden forsvar den kan stille spørgsmål uden at skulle komme med enkle svar den kan rumme tanker drømme og former der endnu mangler navn den kan åbne rum hvor intet endnu er fastlagt den kan udfordre og udvide de former vi tager for givet den kan igangsætte langsomme bevægelser der ændrer vores grundantagelser den kan skabe langsigtede forandringer ved at ændre måden vi tænker på den kan danne nye fællesskaber på tværs af de kategorier vi inddeles i den kan holde drømmen i live om at værdi opstår i handling og relation ikke i ejerskab den kan være et fristed for det uplanlagte abstrakte og det der ikke er umiddelbart nyttigt den kan fungere som et frihedsreservoir i en verden hvor frihed ofte omformes til kontrol det der begynder som fiktion eller abstraktion kan blive virkelighed ikke som drømmen oprindeligt forestillede sig men som noget der alligevel bidrager til at forandrer vores fælles virkelighed

    → 12:05 PM, Apr 27
  • DIFFUSED STATES

    DIFFUSED STATES envisions technology built for curiosity and discovery rather than control, showing how paint might bridge digital and physical worlds. DATA FLUENCIES: Rivulets April 18 – June 15, 2025 Opening reception April 18, 6–9pm Gallery hours Fridays, 4pm–9pm; Saturdays and Sundays, 12pm–6pm

    Boston Cyberarts 141 Green Street Boston, MA, USA

    Featuring artists Lai Yi Ohlsen, Lani Asunción, Jazsalyn, Kristoffer Ørum, Caroline Sinders, and Roopa Vasudevan, alongside work from the Data Fluencies Theatre Project (Emerson College, Boston) and DATA/FFECT (York University, Toronto).

    #DATAFLUENCIES #DIFFUSEDSTATES #SpeculativePasts #ThisIsNotHistory #FrihedLighedOgHipHop #TagPhreaks

    → 9:41 PM, Apr 26
  • DIFFUSED STATES (Boston edition part 5 of 8)

    Shortly after boarding our flight back to Denmark, the American businessman beside me folded his Boston Globe to reveal a peculiar advertisement. “The future is Ternary: build your own,” it declared in bold marker above a vibrant photo spread. I nearly choked on my complimentary peanuts. There before me were diverse teenagers gathered around a triangular rainbow-colored computer called “TERNARY PANTS,” their faces lit with excitement beneath caps bearing the same logo. “Interesting, isn’t it?” the businessman remarked casually, noticing my fixation. “My daughter’s been begging for one. Apparently, all the kids are building these now.” He tapped the “Corrected by boatba” notation in the corner before turning the page, oblivious to my shock. What struck me wasn’t the colorful pyramid-shaped hardware or the enthusiastic young users but the dissolution of what had felt like a secret fellowship. Ternary computing had been our shared language, hidden knowledge that bonded us across continents. Now it belonged to everyone—to smiling teens with branded caps standing before graffiti walls, pointing at green text screens. That night, after landing, I dialled into our usual conference call, the line bridged across multiple countries with our modified equipment. “You won’t believe what I saw in the Boston Globe,” I began, my voice hollow. “It’s gone mainstream.” The cryptic text beneath the image only reinforced our sense of displacement—the made up words “Kites and Llorpts” that was part of once-secret private language of tagphreaking. What we had sought on our trip had been there in plain sight—not as subculture but as newspaper-advertised youth culture—so ordinary it had become next to invisible.

    DATA FLUENCIES: Rivulets April 18 – June 15, 2025 Opening reception April 18, 6–9pm Gallery hours Fridays, 4pm–9pm; Saturdays and Sundays, 12pm–6pm

    Boston Cyberarts 141 Green Street Boston, MA, USA

    Featuring artists Lai Yi Ohlsen, Lani Asunción, Jazsalyn, Kristoffer Ørum, Caroline Sinders, and Roopa Vasudevan, alongside work from the Data Fluencies Theatre Project (Emerson College, Boston) and DATA/FFECT (York University, Toronto).

    #DATAFLUENCIES #DIFFUSEDSTATES #SpeculativePasts #ThisIsNotHistory #FrihedLighedOgHipHop #TagPhreaks

    → 1:37 PM, Apr 23
  • kærlighedserklæring til, hvad Billedkunstskolerne på Det Kongelige Danske Kunstakademi er, og hvad de kunne blive (da)

    Som svar på det aktuelle jobopslag (https://www.kunstakademiet.dk/da/kontakt/ledige-stillinger) tillader jeg mig her at dele en kærlighedserklæring til, hvad Billedkunstskolerne på Det Kongelige Danske Kunstakademi er, og hvad de kunne blive.

    Kære Kunstakademi,

    Dette er ikke en ansøgning, men en kærlighedserklæring. Jeg er for gammel, slidt, kontrær og for længe væk fra undervisningsgerningen nu til at komme i betragtning – og måske netop derfor kan jeg drømme relativt frit om, hvad du kunne blive, samtidig med at jeg anerkender de institutionelle realiteter, du opererer inden for.

    Jeg drømmer om et akademi, der tør genbesøge og genaktualisere den rige arv af både vellykkede og mindre vellykkede eksperimenter – fra den fransk inspirerede mesterlæres intime samskabelse til Black Mountains radikale ophævelse af grænserne mellem kunst og liv; fra Michael Ashers kritiske klasser, hvor institutionen selv blev materiale, til de seneste års optagethed af dekolonial teori og tænkning i det antropocæne.

    Jeg tror måske det er på tide at stille spørgsmålstegn ved forestillingen om kunsthistorien som en lineær progression. Måske er det tid til at betragte den som et rigt reservoir af samtidige muligheder frem for en udviklingslinje, hvor nye ideer nødvendigvis erstatter ældre.

    For Skolen for konceptuelle og kontekstuelle praksisser ser jeg et særligt potentiale i at genaktivere dens historiske opgave: at skabe konfrontation med arbejdsopgaver ude i samfundet. Ikke blot i form af udsmykningsopgaver eller institutionelle kunstprojekter, men som reelle eksperimenter med kunstens rolle i samfundsmæssige transformationer – lokalt og globalt.

    Jeg anerkender, at akademiet arbejder inden for institutionelle rammer, og at de studerende skal forberedes på at kunne navigere både inden for og uden for dem. Den kommende professor bør derfor have erfaring med begge verdener – ikke kun den etablerede kunstverden, men også med selvorganiserede initiativer, kollektive praksisser og alternative økonomier.

    De studerende fortjener en uddannelse, der både ruster dem til at indgå i større institutioner og giver dem mulighed for at bevare deres kunstneriske integritet gennem bæredygtige praksisser uden behov for institutionel validering.

    Det kunne for eksempel udmøntes i semestre struktureret omkring samarbejder med både institutioner og græsrodsinitiativer, kurser i alternative økonomiske modeller for kunstnerisk praksis og praktisk træning i både institutionsforståelse og selvorganisering.

    I en tid, hvor kunst primært eksisterer digitalt og kunstproduktion uundgåeligt involverer digitale værktøjer – fra ansøgningers Word-skabeloner til sociale mediers algoritmer – er det paradoksalt, at digital kunst ofte reduceres til passiv anvendelse af kommerciel software. I stedet for denne begrænsende tilgang drømmer jeg om en teknologisk kunstpraksis inspireret af den legende hackers nysgerrige og kritiske mindset, hvor teknologi ikke blot accepteres som færdige produkter, men udforskes som råmaterialer. En praksis hvor digitale værktøjer kan skilles ad, ombygges og sammensættes på uventede måder, der udfordrer de kommercielle rammer og åbner for nye kunstneriske muligheder og erkendelser.

    Jeg forestiller mig studieforløb, hvor de studerende lærer af open source-bevægelsens principper: åbenhed, kollektiv udvikling og frit delte ressourcer. Hvor de udvikler alternative teknologiske infrastrukturer, der bygger på andre værdier end Big Techs effektivitet, skalerbarhed og profit.

    Det handler ikke om at afvise det digitale, men om at insistere på, at kunstnere skal forstå teknologiens fundament, fordi det er så stor en del af vores samtid og kunne transformere den. At se fejl, glitches og hacks som produktive åbninger til nye kunstneriske muligheder – at give de studerende lov til at fejle og skabe værker, der både afslører og udfordrer de kommercielle platformes skjulte logikker og magtstrukturer. Og måske at træde velinformeret og kritisk væk fra de standardværktøjer, som meget kunst i dag produceres ved hjælp af.

    Jeg drømmer fortsat om et akademi, der forbinder det lokale og det globale – hinsides de etablerede kunstneriske centre. Det handler ikke blot om at inkludere flere “eksotiske” stemmer i curriculum, men om at gentænke vidensproduktion og udvekslingsformer fra bunden.

    Det kunne betyde langvarige samarbejder med kunstnere og institutioner i det globale syd, systematisk revision af curriculum med fokus på mangfoldige kulturelle perspektiver og udvekslinger med oversete kunstmiljøer i Danmark – fra Lolland til Nordjylland – ikke som eksotiske afstikkere, men som ligeværdige samarbejder.

    Jeg anerkender, at professorstillingen indebærer administrative opgaver. Men snarere end at betragte dette som et nødvendigt onde, kunne administration blive et eksperimentfelt for alternative organisationsformer: roterende ansvarsområder mellem professor og studerende, transparente budgetprocesser og kollektive beslutningsformer, der uddanner de studerende i både institutionel forhandling og demokratisk deltagelse.

    Med så få professorer som der i dag er på billedkunstskolerne, har vi brug for elevdemokratiet som en legitim modvægt – ikke som et abstrakt ideal, men som konkret praksis. Den kommende professor bør ikke frygte dette, men omfavne det som en mulighed for dybere læring og institutionel fornyelse.

    Det kunne tage form af formelle strukturer med reel medindflydelse på curriculum, åbne evalueringsprocesser og kollektive forskningsprojekter, hvor hierarkiet midlertidigt ophæves.

    Jeg anerkender værdien af kunstnerisk excellence, som opslaget fremhæver, men insisterer samtidig på behovet for at udvide forståelsen af, hvad excellence kan være. Jeg håber, at den kommende professor excellerer – ikke nødvendigvis målt på CV-linjer og institutionel anerkendelse, men på kunstnerisk integritet, eksperimentel dristighed og evnen til at skabe meningsfulde forbindelser på tværs af faglige og sociale grænser.

    Dette er drømme, der både anerkender institutionelle realiteter og insisterer på muligheden for transformation indefra. Jeg drømmer om en professor, der kan navigere mellem idealisme og pragmatisme, mellem institutionel legitimitet og systemisk fornyelse.

    Den professor, vi har brug for, er hverken en naiv utopist eller en kynisk systemspiller, men én, der forstår institutionens begrænsninger og muligheder – og kan arbejde strategisk med begge. En person, der kan støtte de studerende i at udvikle praksisser, der både fungerer inden for og udfordrer de eksisterende strukturer.

    I en tid, hvor kunstinstitutioner og uddannelser udfordres af markedskræfter, politisk pres og kulturelle omvæltninger, har vi brug for professorer, der kan forberede de studerende på de realiteter, der er – og de transformationer, der endnu ikke er formuleret.

    Med håb om et Kunstakademi, der tør tænke både pragmatisk og visionært – både inden for og uden for de institutionelle rammer,

    Kh En tidligere underviser, der fortsat drømmer.

    PS: Denne tekst er skrevet i håbet om at inspirere valget af en professor, der forstår, at den mest effektive institutionskritik ofte kommer indefra – fra dem, der kender systemets sprækker og muligheder, og som har den nødvendige legitimitet til at skabe forandring, samtidig med at de bevarer forbindelsen til praksisser og perspektiver i periferien.

    → 11:13 PM, Apr 17
  • Weak theory (en)

    Ideals exist not to be achieved. Utopias should remain unrealized. Non-ideal bodies carve new pathways through the world, revealing landscapes invisible to the seemingly strong. The weakness that awaits us all doesn’t diminish us—it expands our collective imagination. Our inevitable bodily vulnerability is not a tragedy but a shared future that connects us.

    Weakness is a constant force. To acknowledge one’s own weakness is to be a little more at ease with one’s own fallibility. What others fear has already happened to us. Those who know that they are weak wield power awkwardly, revealing its mechanisms and softening its blows.

    The weak cannot stand up for their rights and be heroic. They are not looking for revolution. Yet each and every one of their failures to conform counts as success. Every action without profit is a score against systems of production. Weakness isn’t struggle but a resting state recognizing its limits.

    Weakness creates porosity—a permeable boundary between self and other. The strong build walls; the weak know they are already breached. This permeability is not failure but the condition for genuine exchange. In their incompleteness, the weak remain unfinished, still becoming. Systems of strength require fixed identities; weakness allows for perpetual reinvention.

    The weak doubt their worth just as they doubt their own capacities. This doubt opens spaces for reimagining value. Certainty leads to action but at the cost of nuance and possibility.

    The weakness of hesitation—of holding multiple possibilities simultaneously—allows complexity to remain complex. Sometimes less action and more ambivalence is exactly what change requires. We fail, we die, we are wrong, and yet we act. There is dignity in continuing despite certain defeat.

    Weak histories go forgotten. The weak preserve unwelcome knowledge and weird practices. In the margins of official records lie our most valuable inheritances. The supposedly useless holds answers to questions not yet asked.

    Time moves differently through different bodies. Resting in doubt isn’t absence but presence. Some questions remain perpetually open. Uncertainty offers freedom from false certainty. The temporality of weakness resists acceleration. In slowness, in delay, in the refusal to keep up, weakness finds alternate rhythms more aligned with bodily limits.

    While systems of strength promise safety through control, weakness offers the security of adaptation. The weak bend rather than break. They know how to inhabit uncertainty, how to navigate terrain that shifts beneath their feet. When systems built on illusions of strength collapse, those familiar with limitation will already know how to live.

    Weakness understands interdependence as fact, not choice. Where the strong perceive themselves as autonomous actors, the weak recognize the countless unseen relations that sustain them. This recognition makes possible a politics of care rather than conquest. Weakness creates space for unproductive joy—what cannot be monetized or measured flourishes in the territory of the weak.

    The weak shall inherit the earth—not through conquest but through persistence.

    Perhaps. Or perhaps not.

    → 5:56 PM, Apr 17
  • Teknologiens forventningshorison(da)

    Når vi diskuterer teknologi, diskuterer vi som regel også alt muligt andet. Vi diskuterer fordelingspolitik, børneopdragelse, den fælles infrastruktur, ideologi, økonomi og meget andet, men kalder det teknologi.

    Denne sammenblanding er ikke tilfældig. Meget af den fælles diskussion domineres af Big Techs fortællinger om teknologiske “fremskridt”, der bliver til på baggrund af forestillinger om, hvordan de forventes at opføre sig. Teknologien findes først som en god historie med en passende metafor, der danner grobund for tilblivelsen af noget, der endnu ikke findes. Politikere, investorer og kunder møder først metaforer, der beskriver, hvad vi endnu ikke kan formulere eller forstå - sproget gør forestillede koncepter og fiktioner til legitime mål og får dem til at fremtræde som reelle og måske uomgængelige muligheder for fremtiden.

    Konsekvensen er indsnævring af vores horisont. Der er en uendelig række af mulige fremtider, som kunne blive til, men forventningen om en fremtid med robotstøvsugere, kryptovaluta eller selvkørende biler dækker for mange af dem. Ofte ender vi med at diskutere ud fra de præmisser, tech-industrien udstikker, frem for andre. Vi investerer vores drømme i metaforer og drømmebilleder skabt ud fra præmisser, vi måske tror er vores egne. Silicon Valleys kollektive drømme overdøver alt for tit alle de mange andre fremtider, vi kunne drømme frem sammen.

    Disse drømme giver sig ud for realisme, men er lige så meget drømme og sproglige billeder som vores private fantasier. Tilsyneladende fornuftige horisonter, vi kan sætte vores lid til, så vi slipper for selv at gøre det hårde arbejde med at gøre fremtiden bedre. Det er bekvemt at overlade det til nogle andre, der virker, som om de ved, hvad fremtiden vil bringe, selvom de ved det lige så lidt, som vi gør.

    Når vi endelig mobiliserer modstand, tager den ofte en uproduktiv form. Hvis den instinktive modstand mod at få andres drømme stoppet ned i halsen rejser sig, så bliver det til en defensiv nostalgisk drøm om at kunne sætte verdens ustabilitet ud af spil et øjeblik og fryse forandringer fast. Det er klart, vores historier om fortiden er også en drøm og en måde at forstå og diskutere, hvilken verden vi vil have. Men den er formet af ganske andre kræfter end den teknologiske drøm, jeg beskæftiger mig med her, og som jeg må skrive om en anden gang.

    Vi står derfor i et vakuum mellem to utilfredsstillende positioner. Teknologi behøver ikke være en selvkørende bil eller endnu en måde at gøre os selv til en vare - det kunne være noget så simpelt som en bedre hammer (og det er sikkert vanskeligere, end man skulle tro) eller en bæredygtig digital græsrodsinfrastruktur. Men det bliver det i hvert fald ikke, hvis vi ikke engang tør drømme om alternativer. Hvis vi overlader retten til at drømme om bedre fremtider, teknologi og fremtid til de kedelige dogmatiske drømme, der findes i tech-industrien - hvis vi holder os til de fantasiløse metaforer og enslydende fremtidsvisioner, vi fodres med.

    Så hvordan ser alternativet ud? Hvad hvis vi erstattede tech-industriens besættelse af tempo, effektivitet og optimering med nogle helt andre værdier? Teknologier der forsætligt sænker tempoet, skaber fordybelse eller bare har til formål at være smukke. Forestil dig en teknologi, der ikke blot føjer sig til den allerede ustoppelige strøm af nyt, men som i stedet fryser tiden, giver stilhed og gør plads til eftertanke. Teknologier, der ikke kræver vores opmærksomhed, men giver os den tilbage. Hvorfor genfinder vi ikke retten til at fantasere om andre teknologiske fremtider, som ikke har vækst og acceleration som sine guder?

    Dette er ikke blot drømme. De findes i de sprækker og hjørner, som Silicon Valleys søgelys ikke rammer. De findes i hænderne på mennesker, der udvikler permakulturredskaber og åbne lægemidler, i små kollektiver, der bygger deres egen off-grid energiforsyning og i frie software-bevægelser, der insisterer på, at vi ikke behøver at opgive vores rettigheder for at kunne bruge digitale redskaber. Der findes drømme i de lokale kredsløb af reparationscaféer og folkeskolelærere, der selv koder læringsspil i stedet for at købe dem fra Microsoft eller Gyldendal. Der findes allerede en rodebutik af alternative teknologier, som ikke er nye eller smarte, men som er gode nok, og hvis iboende logik er bundet op på værdierne samarbejde, bæredygtighed og reparerbarhed i stedet for kapitalakkumulation. Lad os rette blikket derhen i stedet for den ørken af enshed, vi normalt tænker på, når vi siger teknologi.

    En central del af denne fornyede opmærksomhed begynder med sproget selv. De dominerende fremtidsfortællinger tales også frem igennem de udtryk, vi bruger om dem. Vi kunne prøve at udskifte tech-industriens yndlingsmetaforer. Væk med skyen, med AI, med disruptive innovation, løsninger og smartness. Ind med skovbundstænkning, kollektive netværk, kompostvenlig produktion, muldvarpearbejde og håndværk. Vores brug af døde metaforer er med til at fryse vores fremtider fast, og nye metaforer er med til at gøre fremtidsforestillinger mere levende.

    For at forstå fremtiden må vi forstå drømmenes oprindelse. Hvor stammer vores drømme om teknologien i øvrigt fra? Vi henter dem fra film og spil, fra tech-pressens evindelige lovprisning af den næste store ting, fra reklamer i vores feed og fra de historier, vores omgivelser fortæller. Vi henter dem fra science fiction-universer, hvor fremtiden alt for ofte er enten utopi eller dystopi. Men fremtiden er hverken utopisk eller dystopisk. Den er rodet og ambivalent. Den bliver til gennem tusinde små dagligdags valg, gennem små forhandlinger om, hvad der skal bevares, hvad der skal forandres og hvordan.

    Men vi er ikke alene, og kollektiv drømmekraft er måske den ressource, vi har mest brug for lige nu. Vi kunne starte med sammen at stille andre spørgsmål til vores teknologi. Ikke om den er effektiv, profitabel eller smart. Men om den er smuk eller nydelsesfuld. Om den giver os magt eller tager den. Om den kan repareres, forstås og ejes i fællesskab. Om den åbner vores forestillingsevne eller lukker den.

    Der ligger derfor et arbejde i at skabe åbne døre for de mange andre metaforer og forestillinger om fremtiden, både dem, der allerede eksisterer, og dem, der endnu ikke er blevet tænkt eller formuleret. Det er måske ikke det mest heroiske arbejde eller den mest direkte måde at skabe forandring på. Men jeg tror, at det kan være med til at gøre en forskel at fantasere højt og urealistisk sammen med andre - for at skabe nye fremtidsorienteringer og forsøge at skabe billeder af dem, der er så overbevisende, at de måske bliver til “virkelighed”. For i sidste ende er fremtidens teknologier formet af de fremtider, vi kan forestille os - og forestillingskraften er noget, vi har til fælles.

    → 11:19 AM, Apr 17
  • Jeg er ikke imod velstand (da)

    Jeg er ikke imod velstand, jeg går bare ind for, at alle skal have adgang til den.

    Jeg er ikke imod forskelle, jeg går bare ind for, at privilegier skal bredes ud til flest muligt.

    Jeg er ikke imod individuel lyst og handlerum, jeg går bare ind for at balancere dem med fællesskabets behov.

    Jeg er ikke imod “dannelse”, jeg tror bare, at den kan tage mange former og komme mange steder fra.

    Jeg er ikke imod finkultur, jeg tror bare, at grænserne mellem “høj” og “lavkultur” er kunstige og kan rives ned.

    Jeg er ikke imod såkaldt traditionelle eller lokale værdier, jeg tror bare, at de allerede rummer forandring og mangfoldighed.

    Jeg er ikke imod det æstetisk raffinerede, jeg tror bare, at det kan findes i både det eksklusive og det almene.

    Jeg er ikke imod det smukke og dyrebare, jeg går bare ind for, at skønhed ikke skal være et privilegium men noget hverdagsligt.

    Jeg er ikke imod æstetik, jeg anerkender bare, at den også altid kan forstås politisk, kulturelt og kontekstuelt.

    Jeg er ikke imod det funktionelle, jeg tror bare, at form og æstetik også kan forstås som funktionelle og politiske på deres egen måde.

    Jeg er ikke imod akademisk viden, jeg går bare ind for også at anerkende erfaringsbaseret visdom fra hverdagslivet.

    Jeg er ikke imod politik, jeg går bare ind for at anerkende, at politik er en af mange mulige måder at forstå relationer på.

    Jeg er ikke imod revolution, jeg venter bare ikke på at den kommer men forsøger at gøre verden om indefra der hvor jeg befinder mig.

    Jeg er ikke imod at deltage i det bestående samfund, jeg tror bare, at deltagelse og modstand skal praktiseres på samme tid.

    Jeg er ikke imod kompromisser, jeg tror bare, at de skal være begyndelsen på virkelig forandring.

    Jeg er ikke imod at kommunikere gennem skrift, jeg går bare ind for at anerkende, at sproget altid både afslører og skjuler.

    Jeg er ikke imod det komplekse, jeg synes bare, målet må være at gøre det tilgængeligt uden at forsimple det til ukendelighed.

    Jeg er ikke imod nødvendig forsimpling og generalisering hvis det er nødvendigt, blot vi husker at det er hvad der er tale om.

    Jeg er ikke imod konklusioner, jeg går bare ind for konklusioner, der åbner for nye spørgsmål.

    #stuffiwonderabout #tingjegspørgermigselvom

    → 11:10 AM, Apr 16
  • DIFFUSED STATES

    DIFFUSED STATES constructs a semi-believable narrative of alternative technological history where street art and infrastructure merge into new forms of expression.

    DATA FLUENCIES: Rivulets April 18 – June 15, 2025 Opening reception April 18, 6–9pm Gallery hours Fridays, 4pm–9pm; Saturdays and Sundays, 12pm–6pm

    Boston Cyberarts 141 Green Street Boston, MA, USA

    Featuring artists Lai Yi Ohlsen, Lani Asunción, Jazsalyn, Kristoffer Ørum, Caroline Sinders, and Roopa Vasudevan, alongside work from the Data Fluencies Theatre Project (Emerson College, Boston) and DATA/FFECT (York University, Toronto).

    #DATAFLUENCIES #DIFFUSEDSTATES #SpeculativePasts #ThisIsNotHistory #FrihedLighedOgHipHop #TagPhreaks

    → 6:35 PM, Apr 15
  • DIFFUSED STATES (Boston edition part 4 of 8)

    By the mid-90s, three of us had saved up enough to visit New York, inspired by the Copenhagen tagphreakers and their ternary computing experiments described in underground zines. We sought the legendary Phreaker Bench, convinced it was the hub of a movement combining electronics and graffiti. When we reached the NTA-3986zinl Concurse station, we found only empty wooden benches beneath a black station sign. The special equipment we’d read about was nowhere to be seen. One of us thought we must have misunderstood the old messages, that “the bench” was never a real place but a symbol for hidden meeting points. Another figured we’d arrived too late. We spent hours checking walls with voltage meters, looking for any trace of special paint or hidden circuits, but only picked up subway noise and taxi radio chatter. Our equipment—a stained backpack with antenna-studded devices and modified spray cans—seemed ridiculous in hindsight. Over two days, we investigated phone booths, graffiti spots, and switching stations. We checked surfaces with UV lights and demonstrated our techniques to confused local artists and railway workers. We talked to countless people, but only one aging phone company worker vaguely recalled finding strange conductive paint near Canal Street years ago. Flying home with unused equipment, we wondered if we’d misunderstood everything or simply arrived too late.

    DIFFUSED STATES is a part of DATA FLUENCIES: Rivulets April 18 – June 15, 2025 Opening April 18, 6–9pm Fridays, 4pm–9pm; Saturdays and Sundays, 12pm–6pm

    Boston Cyberarts, 141 Green Street, Boston, MA, USA

    #DATAFLUENCIES #DIFFUSEDSTATES #SpeculativePasts #ThisIsNotHistory #FrihedLighedOgHipHop #TagPhreaks

    → 9:35 AM, Apr 15
  • DIFFUSED STATES

    DIFFUSED STATES charts the emergence of imaginary communication networks maintained by communities, integrating the numerous playful subversions that have been systematically excluded from traditional narratives of technological development.

    DATA FLUENCIES: Rivulets April 18 – June 15, 2025 Opening reception April 18, 6–9pm Gallery hours Fridays, 4pm–9pm; Saturdays and Sundays, 12pm–6pm

    Boston Cyberarts 141 Green Street Boston, MA, USA

    Featuring artists Lai Yi Ohlsen, Lani Asunción, Jazsalyn, Kristoffer Ørum, Caroline Sinders, and Roopa Vasudevan, alongside work from the Data Fluencies Theatre Project (Emerson College, Boston) and DATA/FFECT (York University, Toronto).

    #DATAFLUENCIES #DIFFUSEDSTATES #SpeculativePasts #ThisIsNotHistory #FrihedLighedOgHipHop #TagPhreaks

    → 2:45 PM, Apr 14
  • DIFFUSED STATES (Boston edition part 3 of 8)

    In the early 90s, we gathered in the local youth club rather than rail depots, our collective slowly expanding beyond its original core members. Most afternoons, we’d occupy the club for the detailed work of assembling our zines. Our triangular publications, stained with coffee and marked with hand-drawn circuit diagrams, proudly displayed the bold “TAG PHREAKS” logo that became our calling card. The colorful holographic triangular stickers beneath our paper zines became our secondary medium—their reflective surfaces encoded with symbols that referenced our analog hacking techniques. The ink stamp visible on the wooden table alongside our triangular zines wasn’t merely for postage but marked each issue with a unique identifier linking it to our distribution network. Studio work sessions taught us to blend artistic expression with technical knowledge, creating publications that documented the intersection of graffiti culture and phone phreaking. By ‘92, our zine had evolved beyond simple documentation, incorporating intricate circuit diagrams disguised as artistic patterns—creating a visual language that authorities couldn’t decode. During our weekly meet-ups, we would spread our triangular zines across wooden tables, use black ink stamps to mark them, and with careful attention to who received which issue, distribute another node in our growing underground information network.

    DIFFUSED STATES is a part of DATA FLUENCIES: Rivulets April 18 – June 15, 2025 Opening April 18, 6–9pm Fridays, 4pm–9pm; Saturdays and Sundays, 12pm–6pm

    Boston Cyberarts, 141 Green Street, Boston, MA, USA

    #DATAFLUENCIES #DIFFUSEDSTATES #SpeculativePasts #ThisIsNotHistory #FrihedLighedOgHipHop #TagPhreaks

    → 1:36 PM, Apr 14
  • DIFFUSED STATES

    DIFFUSED STATES imagines communication networks maintained by communities—playful subversions that exist outside traditional technological development. DATA FLUENCIES: Rivulets April 18 – June 15, 2025 Opening reception April 18, 6–9pm Gallery hours Fridays, 4pm–9pm; Saturdays and Sundays, 12pm–6pm

    Boston Cyberarts 141 Green Street Boston, MA, USA

    Featuring artists Lai Yi Ohlsen, Lani Asunción, Jazsalyn, Kristoffer Ørum, Caroline Sinders, and Roopa Vasudevan, alongside work from the Data Fluencies Theatre Project (Emerson College, Boston) and DATA/FFECT (York University, Toronto).

    #DATAFLUENCIES #DIFFUSEDSTATES #SpeculativePasts #ThisIsNotHistory #FrihedLighedOgHipHop #TagPhreaks

    → 3:36 PM, Apr 9
  • POLYFONI (da)

    Det er klart, at der er en officiel historie om kunsten, landet, stedet vi kommer fra osv. Der er historier, vi fortæller hinanden og tror alle er enige om. Der er historier om os, som vi hører og ikke synes passer. Der er historier, man rødmer, når man tænker på, og aldrig fortæller nogen. Disse utallige beretninger taler ofte i munden på hinanden. Enhver historie er en reduktion. Enhver kanon er en fiktion. Enhver definition af hvem “vi” er, er en kampplads om retten til at definere, hvem der tilhører vi’et, og hvem der ikke gør. Det såkaldte “vi” er ikke noget naturligt, men noget, vi selv har skabt og konstant omskaber. Man kan fortælle f.eks. en historie om hvordan kunst er en del af et stort kollektivt arbejde, hvor den ene kunstners arbejde bygger videre på de andres. Eller man kan gøre hvert kunstværk til et udtryk for kunstnerens private inderste. Man kunne skildre tilværelsen som et “gør-det-selv-projekt” uden hjælp fra andre eller lægge vægten på afhængigheden af andre. Vi har nok alle sammen brug for en historie, der forenkler verden, så vi kan handle ud fra den forenklede forståelse. Ellers lammes vi af virkelighedens uendeligt mange mulige fremstillinger. Selvom vi har brug for at forsimple verden, så forsvinder koret af andre mulige narrativer ikke. Vi vælger blot at se bort fra dele af virkeligheden for at kunne se enkeltheder og få retning. Men i baggrunden lyder en mangfoldighed af stemmer, der fortæller historier, der ikke går væk. Mindre lokale beretninger der vil frem. Fornemmelser af sammenhænge og årsagssammenhænge, der er blevet fortrængt til rygter og vandrehistorier. Historier er ikke kun fortællinger, men tankemønstre, der former, hvordan vi ser verden. Enhver samling af godkendte kunstværker eller litteratur viser, at noget altid mangler. Vores forsimplinger er ikke kun praktiske nødvendigheder, men også måder at fordele magt på. Bag trygge fremstillinger gemmer sig det, som ikke passer ind i det herskende verdensbillede. Nødvendige forsimplinger og generaliseringer knager og giver sig, mens nogle historier huskes og andre glemmes. Vi kæmper om retten til at fortælle de beretninger, der tilslører samfundets modsætninger. Vi strides om magten til at bestemme hvilke historier der regnes som sande. Vi mødes i mellemrummene mellem konkurrerende fortællinger. Vi stræber efter at få øje på det, som de narrativer, vi lever i og med, prøver at udelukke. Dette på trods af at vi så hurtigt kommer til at tage dem for gode varer. I de små tomrum, der endnu ikke er blevet erobret af fortællinger eller blot er blevet glemt, der findes muligheden for forandring. #stuffiwonderabout #tingjegspørgermigselvom

    → 12:40 PM, Apr 8
  • DIFFUSED STATES (Boston edition part 2 of 8)

    The so-called “Boston Technique” arrived in Denmark on distorted mix-tapes, featuring Boston artists rhyming about making spray cans with specialized nozzles and pressure mechanisms for producing tones and making radio transmissions. Subsequently, these methods surfaced in the new European zines that we began to see locally, their pages paint-spattered and filled with annotations from other tagphreakers striving to decode the Boston approach. Many nights we pored over blurry illustrations and photographs, attempting to comprehend how they’d retrofitted standard spray paint caps to manage pressure and flow while incorporating signal-generating technology. What few images were available to us revealed apparatus constructed inside partially hollow Krylon cans, equipped with miniature transmitters, frequency modulators and diffusion modulators. Despite lacking access to the components we saw in the photos, we continually discussed how to create similar tools using regional resources. Throughout those years, we carefully examined the photocopied blueprints trying to build our own functioning ‘ternary’ arrangements. Slowly we uncovered what Boston Tagphreaks had know for a long time as we began to mix pressurized paint processors with ternary transmitters.

    DIFFUSED STATES is a part of DATA FLUENCIES: Rivulets April 18 – June 15, 2025 Opening April 18, 6–9pm Fridays, 4pm–9pm; Saturdays and Sundays, 12pm–6pm

    Boston Cyberarts, 141 Green Street, Boston, MA, USA

    #DATAFLUENCIES #DIFFUSEDSTATES #SpeculativePasts #ThisIsNotHistory #FrihedLighedOgHipHop #TagPhreaks

    → 11:21 AM, Apr 8
  • Butikstyverialderen (da)

    Jeg ved ikke med dig, men der hvor jeg kommer fra var der noget de voksne kaldte butikstyverialderen. Det var som en stille fælles beslutning blandt de børn og unge der boede langs forstædernes tognet. I DSB-kiosken på Bagsværd station så jeg hvor seje piger med hoops fyldte lommerne ved udgangen og så ud til at nyde at overskride usynlige grænser mindst lige så meget som Jenka tyggegummi de delte på bænken.

    Selv var jeg lidt for nervøst anlagt til den slags heroisme - af og til købte jeg diskret en Yankie bar og påstod at jeg havde stjålet den - forsøgte at købe mig til at passe ind i de andres overskridelser uden at nogen tog notits af mig af den grund.

    Jeg husker det som alle dem jeg gik i klasse med eller kendte “kørte på røven” når de kunne, uanset om de havde penge til det eller ej. [At “køre på røven” betød at køre med toget uden billet] På trods af alle os i butikstyverialderen faldt samfundet ikke fra hinanden og de sidste tog holdt ikke op med at køre, tværtimod blev DSB-kioskerne til Seven Eleven og billetkontoret til en ubemandet automat. Impulsen til at være på tværs og manglen på respekt for ejendomsretten ændrede ikke samfundet.

    Senere kom det på mode at gå i bukser der havde et hul der hvor tyverialarmen var blevet revet ud. Og der gik ikke lang tid før man i de samme butikker der tidligere var blevet bestjålet kunne købe bukser der var blevet designet med huller så man kunne købe sig til fornemmelsen af et normbrud, købe sig til fornemmelsen af at være en del af en grænseoverskridelsesklub.

    De fleste af os voksede ud af butikstyverialderen og blev såkaldte fornuftige mennesker. I dag er det sidste jeg gider er at skulle løbe fra en ‘lør eller ‘desper for at slippe for at købe en billet eller dele en stjålet chokoladebar på en bænk. Alligevel bor butikstyverialderen stadig i mig - ikke bare som et fjernt minde, men som en levende drøm om at tingene kunne være anderledes.

    For var det ikke også en proto-politisk handling, alle de gratis ture i S-toget? En fælles ufromuleret drøm om en verden hvor transport ikke var en vare men en ret, hvor bevægelse gennem byen var lige så fri og gratis som at trække vejret? Jeg tænker tit på at den slags små oprør er mere end bare teenage-oprør de blev gjort til - de var også spæde, uartikulerede forsøg på at forestille sig et andet samfund.

    Man behøver ikke vokse ud af håbet om at ejerforhold kan ændres, at togene kunne være fælles eje i mere end bare navnet, at de kunne køre uden billet og kontrollørtrusler. Vi kan stadig bære drømmen om at det kunne være anderledes samtidig med at vi betaler vores skat og køber vores rejsekort .

    Butikstyverialderen handlede måske ikke kun at stjæle, men også at drømme om et samfund bygget på andre værdier end profit og privat ejendomsret. Og der er en drøm behøver man ikke at vokse fra, selv om.man bevæger os rundt i et system, vi er kritiske overfor. Tværtimod - måske er det netop indefra som tilsyneladende fornuftige voksne, at vi bør tage fat of forme det samfund vi bor og de strukturer vi næres afi anderledes anderledes.

    → 12:06 PM, Apr 5
  • DIFFUSED STATES

    The title of DIFFUSED STATES reflects the physical dispersion of paint, algorithmic image generation, and the spread of grassroots technology across urban environments.

    DATA FLUENCIES: Rivulets April 18 – June 15, 2025 Opening April 18, 6–9pm Fridays, 4pm–9pm; Saturdays and Sundays, 12pm–6pm

    Boston Cyberarts 141 Green Street Boston, MA, USA

    #DATAFLUENCIES #DIFFUSEDSTATES #SpeculativePasts #ThisIsNotHistory #FrihedLighedOgHipHop #TagPhreaks

    → 9:37 AM, Apr 5
  • DIFFUSED STATES (Boston edition part 1 of 8)

    It was sometime in the early ’80s when my friends and I first heard whispers about hidden signals embedded in traded mixtapes circulating through Copenhagen’s suburban underground. Stories filtered through school hallways and from older siblings who’d come home late with paint-stained hands, telling tales of something strange happening to the trains in the quiet outskirts of the Danish capital. A dog-eared copy of the “Tagphreaks” zine became our bible—a mysterious publication passed hand to hand documenting techniques for “phreaking” urban spaces with spray-paint. With our limited grasp of the English text and diagrams, we pieced together theories until curiosity finally pulled us toward the train yards ourselves. Our first nights by the red DSB train cars yielded nothing but doubt. Armed with a salvaged boombox and spray cans stolen from a neighbor, we snuck into the train yard finding neither the triangular markings with embedded circuitry nor the weird radio signals we had expected. But we kept going back. Then one night, we discovered them—geometric arrows and scattered squares full of glittering circuits adorning the rail cars. The boombox suddenly picked up voices between frequencies as we observed the S-train signals responding to the improvised transmitters we had built from the “Tagpheaks” plans. We cheered as we realized these symbols and circuitry were exactly what we’d been searching for. Before long, we were painting trains, soldering circuits and connecting with other groups of tagphreakers all along our trainline.

    DIFFUSED STATES is a part of DATA FLUENCIES: Rivulets April 18 – June 15, 2025 Opening April 18, 6–9pm Fridays, 4pm–9pm; Saturdays and Sundays, 12pm–6pm

    Boston Cyberarts, 141 Green Street, Boston, MA, USA

    #DATAFLUENCIES #DIFFUSEDSTATES #SpeculativePasts #ThisIsNotHistory #FrihedLighedOgHipHop #TagPhreaks

    → 10:06 AM, Apr 4
  • DIFFUSED STATES

    DIFFUSED STATES presents a speculative world where modified spray paint interacts with electromagnetic infrastructure, creating unexpected connections across urban landscapes.

    DATA FLUENCIES: Rivulets April 18 – June 15, 2025 Opening reception April 18, 6–9pm Gallery hours Fridays, 4pm–9pm; Saturdays and Sundays, 12pm–6pm

    Boston Cyberarts 141 Green Street Boston, MA, USA

    Featuring artists Lai Yi Ohlsen, Lani Asunción, Jazsalyn, Kristoffer Ørum, Caroline Sinders, and Roopa Vasudevan, alongside work from the Data Fluencies Theatre Project (Emerson College, Boston) and DATA/FFECT (York University, Toronto).

    #DATAFLUENCIES #DIFFUSEDSTATES #SpeculativePasts #ThisIsNotHistory #FrihedLighedOgHipHop #TagPhreaks

    → 11:13 AM, Apr 3
  • DATA FLUENCIES: Rivulets opening April 18

    April 18 – June 15, 2025 Opening reception April 18, 6–9pm Gallery hours Fridays, 4pm–9pm; Saturdays and Sundays, 12pm–6pm

    Boston Cyberarts 141 Green Street Boston, MA, USA

    Featuring artists Lai Yi Ohlsen, Lani Asunción, Jazsalyn, Kristoffer Ørum, Caroline Sinders, and Roopa Vasudevan, alongside work from the Data Fluencies Theatre Project (Emerson College, Boston) and DATA/FFECT (York University, Toronto).

    The first of three thematically-connected shows on view across North America in mid-2025, this exhibition investigates art’s potential for reimagining our often narrow understandings of data and machine learning. Using the rivulet (a small, localized stream that flows into larger systems) as a conceptual starting point, the projects in this show work together to explore the ways that adjusting or reconfiguring our individual experiences of data-driven and machine learning systems might lead to broader systemic change. Through critique and subversion of existing technological systems, along with reflection on their prevalence in our lives, the works seen here offer ways to reimagine the data that surrounds us, and to ask what might be possible instead.

    Data Fluencies: Rivulets features the work of six contemporary artists, alongside experimental research supported by the Mellon Foundation-funded Data Fluencies Project (based out of the Digital Democracies Institute at Simon Fraser University). The exhibition aims to provide open public engagement with the research outputs emerging from the larger project and place them next to cutting-edge and critical work of artists examining the same themes and ideas. Together, the artists and researchers featured here offer us ways to (re)consider our relationships with the data that drives our everyday lives—and perhaps find new routes to agency once we are able to do so.

    The Data Fluencies exhibitions are generously supported by the Mellon Foundation and the Digital Democracies Institute at Simon Fraser University (Vancouver). Organized by Roopa Vasudevan, a co-PI on the Data Fluencies Project. Visual identity by PROPS SUPPLY.

    #DATAFLUENCIES #SpeculativePasts #ThisIsNotHistory #FrihedLighedOgHipHop #TagPhreaks #DIFFUSEDSTATES

    → 11:14 PM, Apr 2
  • Where the Walls Weep Sugar / Hvor Væggene Græder Sukker 4

    “Pleasure has become a weapon, and this collective transformation never stops. Arm in arm, they eat themselves free from oppression, making their bodies into barricades of pastry. Here, the ephemeral and useless are celebrated – the pure joy of creating something that disappears at the moment it is enjoyed. But as the cakes are digested and the walls crumble, an ambiguous question arises: Are they becoming the architecture, or is the architecture becoming them? Where is the boundary between the creator and the created? Is it the building’s sugar crystal structures that permeate the bodies, or is it the bodies that dissolve the building?” Exhibition Information: Visit KH7 Artspace at Sydhavnsgade 7, 8000 Aarhus March 1-30, 2025 #arhusart #artistassociationjutland #wherethewallsweepsugar #danishcontemporaryart #frihedlighedoghiphop #tankhiphop #aiart Note: This the fourth part of text a translation of the audio narrative that can be heard in the exhibition.

    → 12:00 PM, Mar 27
  • Where the Walls Weep Sugar / Hvor Væggene Græder Sukker 3

    “With each bite, their bodies become more unruly – fingers of braided Danish pastry form into fists, hair of spun sugar flutters like rebellious flags, and eyes like small rum balls sparkle with mild revolution. Their bones have become crisp vanilla wreaths that crack against the teeth of the world.” Exhibition Information: This work contributes to Denmark’s artist-run initiatives that form the heart of the local art scene Part of an independent and artist-driven organization Experience 26 works by 28 artists, each lasting 26 minutes #contemporaryart #aiart #aarhuskunst #kh7artspace #flux1 #arhusart #artistassociationjutland Note: This the third part of text a translation of the audio narrative that can be heard in the exhibition.

    → 11:59 AM, Mar 27
  • Where the Walls Weep Sugar / Hvor Væggene Græder Sukker 2

    “The square meters have cast off their chains and are now a chaotic collective of edible cake bases growing wildly in patterns no architect could have predicted. New bodies have occupied the space and declared it a self-governing cake zone. Here they literally eat their way through the walls of the system and taste a world without hierarchies.” Exhibition Information: A self-initiated group exhibition by The Artist Association Jutland (www.ksjylland.dk) The work features an AI-generated photograph (flux.v1) and a 1-minute audio piece Transforming the industrial architecture of Sydhavnsgade 7 Supported by the Danish Arts Foundation #contemporaryart #aiart #aarhuskunst #kh7artspace #flux1 Note: This the second part of text a translation of the audio narrative that can be heard in the exhibition.

    → 11:58 AM, Mar 27
  • Where the Walls Weep Sugar / Hvor Væggene Græder Sukker 1

    “At Sydhavnsgade 7, the building twists itself free and transforms into cake. The former concrete walls, where harbour workers once took their hungry breaks, have now become a rebellious mass of marzipan and icing sugar that refuses to comply. Wild sugar lumps explode through the facade as a blossoming resistance against moderation and productivity.” Exhibition Information: “Where the Walls Weep Sugar / Hvor Væggene Græder Sukker” Part of “TIME, 26 works, 26 minutes, 28 artists” March 1-30, 2025 KH7 ARTSPACE, Sydhavnsgade 7, 8000 Aarhus, Denmark www.kh7artspace.dk #contemporaryart #aiart #aarhuskunst #kh7artspace #flux1 #arhusart #artistassociationjutland Note: This the first part of text a translation of the audio narrative that can be heard in the exhibition.

    → 11:58 AM, Mar 27
  • THE OLD GATE AT FOLKETS PARK

    A gateway stands in Malmö, telling stories since 1891. The Old Gate at Folkets Park isn’t just an entrance – it’s a living piece of history that keeps changing with the times. Built from scaffolding and bits and pieces people saved from the scrapheap, it shows how Malmö has grown from a factory town into a place buzzing with art and music. This spot is where worlds meet. Here, you’ll find retired factory workers teaching young people everything they know, especially about building sound systems. Old electricians work their magic with audio wiring, while former carpenters shape wooden speaker boxes with the care that comes from years of practice. Metalworkers who once worked in the factories now bend and weld frames to hold all the equipment steady. The gate area keeps the spirit of Malmö’s working people alive in a new way. Where workers once gathered to sing in choirs and dance to orchestras, now people come together to make music of all kinds. It’s amazing to see former textile workers, who used to keep factory machines running smoothly, now fixing audio cables and putting together circuit boards. Through these sound systems, pumping out everything from hip-hop to community festivals, the city’s factory days live on in today’s music scene. The “Även staden drömmer om att vara en annan” series presents alternative visions of Malmö City Hall, Folkets Park, and the gallery at Drottninggatan 6. At the Edge II – Featuring works by Jamila Drott, Maxime Hourani, Maia Torp Neergaard, Kristoffer Ørum Curator: Kevin Malcolm Dates: March 14 – April 13, 2025 Vernissage: Friday, March 14, 5–8pm The exhibition is supported by Kulturrådet, Malmö stad, Region Skåne and Statens Kunstfond. Thanks to Lisa Strømbeck for Swedish proofreading. #frihedlighedoghiphop #tankhiphop

    → 10:51 AM, Mar 26
  • DROTTNINGGATAN 6

    Since 1935, Drottninggatan 6 has been more than just a building – it’s a place where people can really make their mark. Its open design has let generations of residents remake it in their own way. The first people who lived here knew a thing or two about garden plots, and they worked magic with whatever materials they could find. They pieced together entire kitchens from salvaged stuff and cleverly built balconies from old scaffolding. These days, people living there keep that creative spirit going strong. They’ve turned everyday stuff into painting tools – pressure cookers and bike pumps become spray painters, reaching from inside walls to the building’s outer face. People mix up their own colors using leftover paint from factories, mixing it with thinners and using compressed air to spray it. The building comes alive with layers of art – kids' drawings peek through between detailed murals and bold graffiti. When the community gets together, the whole building changes as people create temporary doorways between floors and apartments. While these changes don’t stick around forever, they change how neighbors hang out and move through the space. Even as people move in and out, the walls tell their stories through layers upon layers of paint – each one a memory of what this place could be. The “Även staden drömmer om att vara en annan” series presents alternative visions of Malmö City Hall, Folkets Park, and the gallery at Drottninggatan 6. At the Edge II – Featuring works by Jamila Drott, Maxime Hourani, Maia Torp Neergaard, Kristoffer Ørum Curator: Kevin Malcolm Dates: March 14 – April 13, 2025 Vernissage: Friday, March 14, 5–8pm The exhibition is supported by Kulturrådet, Malmö stad, Region Skåne and Statens Kunstfond. Thanks to Lisa Strømbeck for Swedish proofreading. #frihedlighedoghiphop #tankhiphop

    → 9:59 AM, Mar 25
  • BORGERFORSLAG OM ÆGTE FOLKELIGHED OG DANSKHED (DA)

    Nyt borgerforslag med over 4600 støtter udfordrer politikeres brug af “folkelighed” og “danskhed”. FPA indfører folkelighedsbarometer og konsekvenser for politikere, der taler om disse begreber uden at praktisere dem. Se hele forslaget: oerum.org/ATAW/Borg… #automatetheartworld

    → 11:43 PM, Mar 24
  • MALMÖ NEW CITY HALL

    Since the early 1990s, Malmö’s City Hall has been doing things differently, mixing old-school city planning with hip-hop culture. Building on how things were done back in the 1920s, they’ve created a way of running the city that you won’t find anywhere else in Europe. Here, paperwork and creativity don’t fight each other – they make each other better. Picture city council meetings where debates about money and building permits turn into rap battles, with different sides trading verses about their ideas. Department heads mix dance battles with voting, making decisions in a way that’s both fun and gets things done. Number crunchers turn their reports into performances, while plans for new buildings come alive through freestyle rap that helps everyone understand what’s being built and why. When it’s time to hear from the public, city workers jump between giving regular presentations and joining dance sessions to really connect with people. Committee meetings flow with rhymes as locals and city staff swap ideas over beats. Before getting down to business, meetings kick off with break dancing. Old-timers show the newcomers how to mix fresh ideas with getting the job done, keeping the city running smooth while bringing in new ways of doing things.

    The “Även staden drömmer om att vara en annan” series presents alternative visions of Malmö City Hall, Folkets Park, and the gallery at Drottninggatan 6. At the Edge II – Featuring works by Jamila Drott, Maxime Hourani, Maia Torp Neergaard, Kristoffer Ørum Curator: Kevin Malcolm Dates: March 14 – April 13, 2025 Vernissage: Friday, March 14, 5–8pm The exhibition is supported by Kulturrådet, Malmö stad, Region Skåne and Statens Kunstfond. Thanks to Lisa Strømbeck for Swedish proofreading. #frihedlighedoghiphop #tankhiphop

    → 12:51 PM, Mar 24
  • Thorkilds forår (da)

    makertube.net/w/7EZnBc7…

    By day, Thorkild Simonsen was the serious Social Democrat who served as Aarhus mayor from 1982 to 1997 before becoming Denmark’s Interior Minister. But few knew about his alter ego as “The Hip-Hop Mayor.”

    After hours, Mayor Simonsen would exchange his formal attire for street clothes and visit underground hip-hop venues. Despite being in his 50s when hip-hop emerged globally, he embraced the culture and occasionally performed his own political rhymes.

    His unofficial recordings circulated among Aarhus youth, translating municipal politics into beats and rhymes that connected with younger citizens. Even after becoming Interior Minister under Prime Minister Poul Nyrup Rasmussen, where he tackled tough immigration policies, Simonsen maintained his musical connections.

    Thorkild Simonsen passed away in 2022 at age 96, leaving behind both his official political legacy and his surprising reputation as Denmark’s most unlikely hip-hop enthusiast.

    Lyrics and music @emilio_hestepis

    #aarhusernr1 #frihedlighedoghiphop #tankhiphop Aarhus er # 1 Opening at @kunsthalaarhus this June

    → 6:58 PM, Mar 22
  • Announcing the future of artist-free institution-aligned exhibitions. ArtAutomata delivers complete creative control from concept to installation. No more artist negotiations, delays, or compromises—just curatorial vision realized. oerum.org/ArtAutoma… #AutomateTheArtWorld

    → 8:44 PM, Mar 21
  • OPEN CALL: Kiosque de l'In-visible

    We’re seeking experimental video works that explore alternatives to mainstream visual aesthetics and big-budget film production! WHAT: Video works embracing abstraction - no straightforward live-action footage LENGTH: Maximum 7 minutes DEADLINE: April 20, 2025 Selected artists will also curate a program from the submissions, running on our 24/7 accessible outdoor video kiosk in Copenhagen. Think abstract animation, AI-generated imagery, glitch art, 3D rendering, or any creative approach that reveals what can’t be “read” through conventional sight. Submit your work and help us make the invisible visible. Full details on our website: cp.oerum.org/call.html #experimentalvideo #videokiosk #opencall #abstractart #copenhagen #videoart #digitalart #animation #glitchart #contemporaryart #openair #artistopportunity

    → 9:51 AM, Mar 19
  • Automate The Artworld

    Just launched: “Automate The Artworld” - a small collection of web art experiments where I describe ideas to DeepSeek-Coder R1 AI and let it create websites. These works are generated locally on a server using recycled hardware at my studio, run entirely on certified green power. This approach is part of my strategy for damage reduction and building local digital infrastructure that doesn’t rely on energy-intensive cloud services. The results range from exactly what I wanted to wonderfully weird glitches - all exploring the collaborative space between artist and AI. Who’s the real creator? What new forms emerge? Check out the experimental prototypes at oerum.org/pico/Auto… #AutomateTheArtworld

    → 3:24 PM, Mar 18
  • Justice, compassion and beauty

    Justice, compassion and beauty require neither religion nor ideology. Religion and ideology function as control mechanisms that appropriate existing human impulses. Some organizing structures and concepts are obviously beneficial in large complex communities such as contemporary western ones but they are not the source of justice, compassion and beauty and we should be careful not to think so lest we risk societal structures becoming instruments of control and concentrations of power rather than an expression of our commonality and shared circumstances.

    → 9:53 AM, Mar 18
  • RUN YOUR OWN ART SPACE! Embrace the thrill of grant writing, experience the joy of burnout, and delight in gentrification—until sweet failure sets you free! Play our cheery game of inevitable collapse at oerum.org/ARSS 😊 #automatetheartworld

    → 8:32 PM, Mar 16
  • DATA FLUENCIES EXHIBITIONS April–July 2025

    DATA FLUENCIES EXHIBITIONS April–July 2025

    “Data Fluencies: Rivulets” Boston Cyberarts (@bostoncyberarts) Boston, MA, USA Opening April 18, 2025

    “Data Fluencies: Tributaries” Or Gallery (@orgallery) Vancouver, BC, Canada Opening May 29, 2025

    “Data Fluencies: Confluence” Living Arts and Science Center (@lasclex) Lexington, KY, USA Opening June 6, 2025

    Encompassing three thematically connected shows on view across North America in mid-2025, the Data Fluencies exhibition series investigates art’s potential for reimagining our often-narrow understandings of data and machine learning. The exhibitions will run between April and July at Boston Cyberarts (Boston), Or Gallery (Vancouver), and the Living Arts and Science Center (Lexington).

    Each exhibition features work by six contemporary artists—Lai Yi Ohlsen (@laiyi____), Lani Asunción (@lani.asuncion), Jazsalyn (@jazsalyn), Kristoffer Ørum (@kristofferorum), Caroline Sinders (@carolinesinders), and Roopa Vasudevan (@rouxpz)—alongside experimental outputs from the broader Data Fluencies Project, an international research initiative based out of the Digital Democracies Institute at Simon Fraser University. The exhibitions aim to provide open public engagement with the research emerging from the larger project, and place it next to cutting-edge and critical work of artists examining similar themes and ideas.

    Together, these artists and researchers offer us ways to (re)consider our relationships with the data that surrounds and drives our everyday lives—and perhaps find new routes to agency once we are able to do so.

    The Data Fluencies exhibitions are generously supported by the Mellon Foundation (@mellonfoundation) and the Digital Democracies Institute at Simon Fraser University (Vancouver, @simonfraseru). Organized by Roopa Vasudevan, a co-PI on the Data Fluencies Project. Visual identity by PROPS SUPPLY (@props.supply).

    → 3:37 PM, Mar 10
  • Prestigious Exhibition Invitation Generator (EN)

    THE ART WORLD AWAITS! Generate prestigious exhibition invitations tailored to your artistic practice. Our Exhibition Validation Interface creates compelling invitations from fictional institutions and curators—indistinguishable from real opportunities and perfect for funding applications or enhancing your CV. Generate: Prestigious institutional affiliations Convincing curator endorsements Professional documentation that transforms aspirations into credentials

    • more!

    Today’s art economy values documentation over exhibition attendance. The distinction between real and fictional institutions has long since dissolved, and prestige exists independently of physical spaces or art works. Why navigate the traditional gatekeeping system when our fictional invitations function identically for grants and professional advancement? Accelerate your artistic career: oerum.org/Invitatio…

    → 11:28 PM, Mar 8
  • Liroy and Mata (EN)

    As I research Polish rappers for an upcoming show at Bunkier Sztuki, I’ve been thinking about how the speculative ai art project “Frihed, Lighed og Hiphop,” is real in unexpected and slightly disconcerting ways. When I have already imagined several Danish ’90s hip-hoppers becoming political figures, I never expected to encounter real examples like polish rappers Liroy’s journey from pioneering rapper to right-wing parliamentarian and Michał “Mata” Matczak, who declared his presidential ambitions for 2040. History is always weirder and more complex than anything I or the AI can dream up.
    meta: www.youtube.com/watch & liroy www.youtube.com/watch #firhedlighedoghiphop #research #truthisstrangerthanart #monumnetsofafictionalpast #3SeasArtFestival

    → 4:17 PM, Mar 7
  • HAIC-III Opening Seminar: AI & Identity at Aarhus Universitet

    Join us for the opening seminar for the project Human-AI Collaboration: Imaginaries, Interventions, Interfaces (HAIC-III), with keynote by Olga Goriunova

    Generative artificial intelligence complicates the ways in which we express and understand ourselves with and on computers. Our relations to the likenesses and personal styles of ourselves and our peers are somewhat rustled by technologies that both imitate and (often) banalize those very likenesses and styles. How do these neural network-induced technologies affect the ways in which we understand and negotiate our being as subjects and how do they relate to a broader data and platform culture? This opening seminar of the research project Human-AI Collaboration: Imaginaries, Interventions, Interfaces (HAIC-III) marks the beginning of addressing questions such as, how does generative artificial intelligence affect the conditions under which we express and understand ourselves? At the seminar, we will examine subjectivation and self-expressing with(in) generative artificial intelligence, which happens in a counterbalance with algorithmic interpellation and continuous extension of digital/ideal subjects.

    Olga Goriunova, Professor of Media Arts at Royal Holloway, University of London, will deliver a keynote on 22 May and participate in a master class workshop for PhDs on 23 May together with the other members of the research group.

    About HAIC-III: Facing the rapid and continuous proliferation of generative artificial intelligence throughout society, HAIC-III aims to combine humanistic methods with art and design practices to understand these emerging technologies in a wider context of critical data studies, digital aesthetics, and software studies, and to nourish a critical, contentious, and practice-based notion of generative artificial intelligence as an aesthetic and cultural interface.

    The seminar is supported by the Independent Research Fund Denmark, grant ID 10.46540/4256-00095B Preliminary program 22 May (location TBD)

    10.00-10.15: Introduction to the seminar 
    10.15-12.15 (incl. brief break): Olga Goriunova: Ideal Subjects: Abstract People in Data and Culture (abstract & bio below). 
    12.15-13.00: Lunch 
    13.00-15.15 (incl. brief break): Presentations from HAIC-III project members: Kristoffer Ørum, Søren Pold, Kristin Veel, Malthe Stavning Erslev 
    15.15-15.45: Coffee break  
    15.45-16.15: Presentation by Blue Cliff (TBC): What lies beneath
    (working title) - Our relationship with the digital world, Ai and digital communication. The performance is a collaboration between Yael Gaathon (choreographer and performer), Christoffer Brekne (video artist) and kristian hverring (composer) 
    16.00: End of seminar 
    

    23 May (Aarhus Universitet, Åbogade 34 , 8200 Aarhus N. Building 5342 (ADA), room 333)

    Masterclass for PhDs: 9.30-13.00

    Registration: https://au.phd-courses.dk/CourseCatalog/ShowCourse/1746

    AI & Identity: Ideal/digital subjects and their production through profiling, subjectivation, algorithmic interpellation and enunciation. How can we interpret, read and see this, which options does it leave for art, literature, music and critique?

    For the workshop, we are looking for PhDs working with topics within generative AI, platform studies, social media and questions of identity.

    At the workshop participants will be asked to give short presentations (10 minutes) and prepare by enegaging with a selection of approx. 5 topical readings. Participation in the workshop and opening seminar will award 1 ECTS. ABTRACT & BIO for Olga Goriunova’s keynote, May 22 10.00-12.00

    When I am profiled on a movie streaming platform or given the truth of my sleep by my watch, what is the “me” that I have to deal with? The digital subject composed of my data and the data of others, evaluated and spun to make predictions is not my shadow but an abstraction whose making requires some distance. Distance is also core to the idea of the subject’s interiority (looking at, contemplating oneself) that we know from the thinking subject of modernity. The distance of digital subjects, therefore, is not only about fractured noisy data groupings but builds on how we are trained to be subjects. That is why digital subjects are successful: we know them as processes that result in truths, about us and about the world, which we are trained to want in order to become ourselves. Asking how digital subjects as patterns “come back” to us and compel us to want their “truths”, I answer that it is through configuring desire in relation to what is abstract that we learn to orientate ourselves towards calculations and projections now managed by data analytics and AI. From desiring the best test result to desiring the truth of one’s music-listening personality revealed by Spotify, it is about desiring abstractions that are ideal in two meanings of the word: as results of mathematical operations and something to aspire to or confront. The question then is how to make and want different ideals: after all, isn’t that key to what the arts are supposed to be about?

    Olga Goriunova is Professor of Media Arts, Royal Holloway University of London. She is the author of Ideal Subjects. Abstract People in Data and Culture (forthcoming 2025), Bleak Joys. Aesthetics of Ecology and Impossibility (with Matthew Fuller, 2019), Art Platforms and Cultural Production on the Internet (2012) and editor of Fun and Software: Exploring Pleasure, Pain and Paradox in Computing (2014). She was a co-curator of Readme, international touring software art festivals, 2001-2005 and Runme.org software art repository (2003+). She is also a founding co-editor of Computational Culture, a Journal of Software Studies.

    https://darc.au.dk/blog/nyhed/artikel/default-2bcd7609df

    (Photo: Ada Ada Ada: Being represented by data is like losing a part of yourself, 2024)

    → 11:18 AM, Mar 7
  • HOTLINE MOD RADIKALISERING (DA)

    Er du bekymret over en person, som viser tegn på radikalisering mod vores fælles værdier? Frygter du, at de tiltrækkes af ekstremistiske økonomiske bevægelser eller taler om “frihed fra staten”? Du er ikke alene med din bekymring. Find hjælp og vejledning på oerum.org/antiradik…

    → 10:46 AM, Mar 6
  • Self-portrait as the owner of a captive kiosk and purveyor of outmoded and out of fashion ideas

    → 8:57 AM, Mar 5
  • At the Edge II @ Skene, Malmø(SE) Opening Friday 14 March 5–8pm

    At the Edge II – Jamila Drott, Maxime Hourani, Maia Torp Neergaard, Kristoffer Ørum Curator Kevin Malcolm

    14 March – 13 April 2025 Vernissage Friday 14 March 5–8pm

    At the Edge II builds thematically on previous exhibition projects, where questions of place and identity, especially in relation to architecture and urban planning, were framed. At the Edge Part I was shown at Vermilion Sands in Copenhagen in the autumn of 2024. Part II is an extension of a first exhibition that will have a clearer connection to Malmö as a place and context. This series of exhibitions examine the role of the artist and the art space in urban transformations, while being situated in broader discussions about place, capitalism and identity, urban space, speculation and gentrification.

    The exhibition features three of my AI-generated works that reimagine Malmö’s urban landmarks. These speculative images visualize alternative histories for the Old Gate at Folkets Park, Drottninggatan 6, and Malmö’s New City Hall. By blending historical elements with imagined possibilities, the works invite viewers to question how these spaces might have evolved differently through community use, resident modification, and the mixing of formal governance with street expression. The digital images complement the exhibition’s exploration of how urban spaces both shape and are shaped by the people who use them, offering new perspectives on Malmö’s architectural stories and potential futures.

    Thanks to Lisa Strømbeck for Swedish proofreading @jamiladrott #maximehourani @maiatorpneergaard @kristofferorum @ks_malcolm @vermilion_sands

    The exhibition is supported by Kulturrådet, Malmö stad, Region Skåne and Statens Kunstfond. @kulturradet.se @malmo_stad_officiell @regionskane @statenskunstfond

    → 5:27 PM, Mar 4
  • Når krigen kommer (da)

    Når krigen kommer hjem til os, hvem vil så byde os fra nationer, der har vendt verden ryggen, velkomne?

    Når krigen kommer, har vi så endelig åbnet ørene for de færdigheder og den viden, de der er flygtet hertil bar på?

    Når krigen kommer, og vi ikke længere hører til noget sted, vil vi så opgive vores skikke og traditioner for at “passe ind” der, hvor vi nu engang tilfældigvis havner?

    Når krigen kommer, som den altid gør, og imperiet vi lever i bliver et andet, hvordan vil vi så huske de magter, vi tækkes i dag?

    Når krigen kommer, vil vores grænser, som vi har vogtet så nidkært, pludselig blive til linjer i sandet, som vi selv må krydse med bøjet nakke?

    Når krigen kommer, vil vi så ønske, at vi havde lært os de sprog, vi kaldte fremmede, i det land, vi må forlade?

    Når krigen kommer og tvinger os på flugt, vil vi så lære vores børn at bære vores kultur med sig, eller vil vi prøve at glemme, hvad der var engang?

    Når krigen kommer, og vi må søge husly blandt fremmede, vil vi da huske, hvordan vi selv lukkede døren for dem, der bankede på?

    Når vi igen bliver en del af folkevandringer, vil vi så stadig klamre os til de identiteter, vi opdeler verden i?

    Når krigen kommer, og vi måske søger asyl i fremmede lande, vil de så kræve, at vi består sprogprøver på deres modersmål inden for tre år for at få lov til at blive?

    Når krigen kommer, og vi flygter fra vores hjem, vil vi så acceptere at leve i udkanten af samfundet, i særlige “danskerlandsbyer”, adskilt fra den lokale befolkning?

    Når krigen kommer, vil vores uddannelser og erfaring så pludselig være værdiløse i et fremmed system?

    Når krigen kommer, og vi må forlade alt og rejse let, vil fremmede stater så konfiskere vores smykker og opsparinger for at finansiere vores ophold?

    Når krigen kommer, og vi må tilpasse os nye kulturer, vil vi så blive beskyldt for at leve i parallelsamfund, når vi søger sammen med andre danskere og holder vores traditioner i hævd?

    Når krigen kommer, og vi boligplaceres i områder med mange andre danskere, vil vi så vågne en dag til beskeden om, at vores kvarter nu er kategoriseret som en “hård ghetto”? Vil myndighederne tvinge os til at flytte, fordi der er for mange som os samlet på ét sted? Vil vores børn blive tvunget i institutioner 25 timer om ugen for at lære den nye kultur og det nye sprog, mens vores naboer af anden oprindelse kun behøver at sende deres børn i institution 10 timer?

    Når krigen kommer, vil vi da opleve, at vores lejligheder rives ned, fordi områdets andel af “danske flygtninge” skal reduceres til under 30 procent, og at vi får halvt så lang tid som andre til at finde et nyt hjem? Vil vi forstå betydningen af at blive stemplet som et “samfundsproblem” udelukkende baseret på vores oprindelse og antallet af os i samme område?

    Når krigen kommer, vil vi så blive mødt med krav om, at vi skal hilse embedsmænd på bestemte måder for at bevise vores villighed til assimilation?

    Når krigen kommer, og vores børn leger med de lokale børn, vil de så blive kaldt dårligt integrerede, hvis de taler dansk sammen i skolegården?

    Når krigen tvinger os på flugt, vil vi så blive mødt med mistro, når vi fortæller vores historier, og blive bedt om at bevise, at vi er “ægte flygtninge”?

    Når krigen kommer, og det gør den jo før eller siden, bliver det så klart at alle dem vi kalder “fremmede”, er os selv i morgen?

    #stuffiwonderabout #tingjegspørgermigselvom

    → 5:05 PM, Mar 1
  • OPEN CALL FOR GALLERIES | ANNUAL SELECTION 2025

    The selection process is now open for galleries seeking to represent groundbreaking digital artist Kristoffer Ørum for the upcoming year. Selected galleries will receive:

    Enhanced cultural capital through association with Ørum’s innovative digital practice Academic legitimacy through critical theory engagement Exposure to new collectors and institutional networks Featured placement in digital publications and academic journals

    This highly competitive open call evaluates galleries on their ability to provide value to artists through revenue generation, marketing resources, and commitment to artistic freedom. APPLICATION DEADLINE: March 31, 2025 NOTIFICATION: By April 15, 2025 Submit your gallery’s application at: oerum.org/opencall (link in bio) Limited positions available. All applications will be reviewed by a selection committee.

    → 11:30 AM, Feb 28
  • Foreløbige mål og tanker (4/4)

    Med udgangspunkt i Local Ruptures and Technological Reimaginings og den bredere HAIC-III ramme ønsker jeg at udforske, hvordan man kan arbejde uden for standardiserede rammer. Hvad sker der, når man bevidst vælger ikke at passe ind? Hvordan kan tværdisciplinære positioner udfordre både AI-teknologi og kunstnerisk praksis? Samtidig ønsker jeg at udvikle alternative tilgange til AI, hvor systemerne fremhæver lokale kulturelle udtryk i stedet for at ensrette dem.

    Jeg er optaget af at engagere mig kritisk med teknologi og undersøge, om teknologiske begrænsninger kan bruges kreativt. Kan fejl og glitches afsløre AI’s bias og samtidig åbne nye veje for eksperimenterende praksisser? Jeg vil også arbejde på at skrive på et sprog, der både er akademisk og tilgængeligt, så komplekse ideer formidles uden at blive unødigt lukkede.

    Jeg har længe betragtet mig selv som en “pseudo-akademiker”, da jeg har bevæget mig i akademiske kredse uden at være en del af dem. Kunst har altid været min måde at forstå verden på – især nye teknologier som AI. Jeg har tidligere søgt ph.d.-forløb uden held, men nu er jeg her. Hvad betyder det for min praksis at træde ind i denne kontekst? Hvad kan jeg lære af den, og hvad kan jeg bidrage med?

    Langsigtet tænkning er en anden vigtig grund til at tage en PHD for mig. Hvordan kan en kunstnerisk praksis vokse ud over enkeltstående projekter og konstante fondsansøgninger? Hvilke nye strategier og metoder opstår når man er en del af et akademisk fællesskab? Og hvordan kan man være med til at bygge bro mellem institutioner og græsrødder, så flere uden for de etablerede kredse får adgang til viden og ressourcer? Jeg håber at kunne være med til at rejse en bredere diskussion om teknologisk lighed og kulturel mangfoldighed ved at udfordre dominerende utopiske og dystopiske fortællinger om AI.

    Jeg ser frem til at læse mere, skrive mere og tale mere om min praksis og forskning. Det er en luksus for en periode ikke at bekymre sig om økonomi, men i stedet koncentrere sig om at udvikle sin praksis og tænke kritisk over, hvad det vil sige at være kunstner i en tid med hastigt udviklende teknologi. Måske finder jeg undervejs en bedre model for mine aktiviteter – en model, der bygger bro mellem kunst, akademia og teknologiudvikling. Dette er nogle af de overvejelser, der optager mig lige nu, inden jeg rigtig ved hvad en kunstnerisk PHD er.

    → 11:16 PM, Feb 27
  • Min egen situation (3/4)

    De fleste billedkunstneriske ph.d.-forløb i Danmark er finansieret af Novo Nordisk Fonden og er placeret på Det Kongelige Danske Kunstakademis Billedkunstskoler. Min vej er dog anderledes. Min ph.d. er en del af forskningsprojektet Human-AI Collaboration: Imaginaries, Interventions, Interfaces (HAIC-III), hvor jeg samarbejder med Søren Bro Pold (PI), Kristin Veel (Co-PI) og Malthe Stavning Erslev (deltager).

    Projektet undersøger generativ AI (f.eks. ChatGPT, Bard, Midjourney) ud fra et kunstnerisk og humanistisk perspektiv. Hvordan kan kunstneriske og designbaserede tilgange adressere problematiske aspekter af generativ AI? Hvordan kan vi skabe mere nuancerede forståelser af, hvad AI betyder for vores forestillinger om samfund og kultur?

    Mit eget ph.d.-projekt, Local Ruptures and Technological Reimaginings, undersøger skæringspunktet mellem dansk hiphopkultur og arbejderbevægelser gennem lokalt implementerede AI-systemer. Jeg ser teknologiske begrænsninger ikke blot som forhindringer, men som produktive kræfter. Kan man vende tekniske begrænsninger til noget positivt? Hvordan kan fejl og glitches afsløre AI’s bias og skabe alternative måder at bruge teknologien på?

    Som en central del af min ph.d. laver jeg kunstneriske eksperimenter i praksis med såkaldt kunstig intelligens og lokale digitale infrastrukturer. Disse eksperimenter tager form af billeder, videoer og andet materiale skabt fra et billedkunstnerisk perspektiv. Gennem den praktiske kunstneriske proces udforsker jeg, hvordan AI-teknologier kan implementeres og omformes til at reflektere lokale udtryksformer og kulturelle kontekster, frem for at reproducere globale, standardiserede æstetikker og fortællinger.

    Min ph.d. er finansieret af Danmarks Frie Forskningsfond, hvilket er usædvanligt for kunstneriske ph.d.-forløb. Derfor er jeg placeret på Københavns Universitet i stedet for et kunstakademi. Hvilke muligheder opstår i dette skift, og hvordan kan man skabe en praksis, der navigerer mellem kunst, akademia og teknologi?

    → 11:16 PM, Feb 27
  • Den kunstneriske ph.d. i Danmark (2/4)

    II. Den kunstneriske ph.d. i Danmark (2/4)

    I Danmark har udviklingen af den kunstneriske ph.d. rødder tilbage til 1990’ernes diskussioner om kunstnerisk praksis som videnproduktion. Før årtusindskiftet begyndte kunstakademierne at eksperimentere med formater, der kombinerede kunstnerisk praksis med teoretisk refleksion. Disse tidlige eksperimenter var dog ikke formelt anerkendt som ph.d.-programmer og manglede den struktur, vi kender i dag.

    Den formelle etablering skete i 2003 med Kulturministeriets bekendtgørelse, der for første gang gav kunstskolerne mulighed for at huse ph.d. studerende. Det Kongelige Danske Kunstakademi optog de første kunstneriske ph.d.-studerende kort efter. Denne udvikling skal ses i sammenhæng med Bologna-processen, der fra 1999 og frem havde til formål at standardisere de videregående uddannelser i Europa, hvilket førte til en akademisering af kunstuddannelserne generelt. Med oprettelsen af Kulturministeriets Forskningsudvalg i 2004 begyndte en lokal dansk model at tage form, hvor kunstskoler og universiteter samarbejder om ph.d.-forløb. Dette var en anderledes tilgang end i mange andre lande, hvor kunstneriske ph.d.-programmer ofte blev udviklet udelukkende inden for kunstinstitutionerne eller helt integreret i universitetssystemet. Efter en revision af bekendtgørelsen i 2010-2011 blev de kunstneriske ph.d.-programmer fuldt integreret i det danske forskningslandskab, samtidig med at kunstens “særlige karakter” blev respekteret og anerkendt.

    Perioden fra 2010 og frem har været præget af en professionalisering af den kunstneriske ph.d., med etablerede evaluerings- og kvalitetssikringsprocesser. Samtidig har der været en konstant diskussion om, hvordan man bevarer den kunstneriske frihed og eksperimenterende tilgang inden for de akademiske rammer. Denne balance mellem det kunstneriske og det akademiske har været kendetegnende for den danske model. Fra omkring 2015 er finansieringen af kunstneriske ph.d.-projekter i stigende grad blevet overtaget af private fonde, særligt Novo Nordisk Fonden, hvilket har sat nye rammer for, hvilke typer projekter der prioriteres, og hvordan de udformes. Dette har samtidig åbnet for flere ph.d.-pladser, men også skabt en diskussion om forskningsfrihed og uafhængighed.

    Som ph.d.-studerende skal jeg gennemføre et treårigt projekt, der kombinerer kunstnerisk produktion og akademisk skrivning. Hvordan balancerer man disse krav i en praksis, der ofte er flydende og eksperimenterende? Hvordan skaber man en dialog mellem kunstnerisk erfaring og akademiske metoder? Disse spørgsmål er ikke nye, men har været del af en ongoing diskussion i det danske kunstfelt gennem de sidste to årtier.

    → 11:15 PM, Feb 27
  • Hvad er en kunstnerisk ph.d.? (1/4)

    Mange har spurgt mig, hvad en kunstnerisk ph.d. egentlig er, og hvad jeg skal lave de næste tre år. Derfor har jeg skrevet fire små tekster, der giver indblik i hvad en kunstnerisk ph.d. indebærer, hvordan det ser ud i Danmark, min egen specifikke situation, og hvordan jeg selv håber at gribe det an.

    Jeg er netop begyndt på en kunstnerisk ph.d., men jeg leder stadig efter de rette ord til at forklare, hvad det egentlig indebærer – både for andre og for mig selv. Hvordan forener man kunstnerisk praksis med akademisk forskning, og hvad betyder det for måden, vi tænker viden på?

    Den kunstneriske praksisbaserede ph.d. (også kaldet “practice-based” eller “practice-led research”) opstod i 1980’erne og udviklede sig videre i 1990’erne. Den fik først fodfæste på britiske institutioner som University of Portsmouth og University of Middlesex, der omkring 1990 begyndte at anerkende kunstnerisk praksis som en legitim forskningsmetode. Australien fulgte trop med programmer på universiteter som Queensland University of Technology.

    I 2000’erne bredte idéen sig til Skandinavien, Holland og andre europæiske lande. I USA har udviklingen været langsommere. Grundtanken bag en kunstnerisk ph.d. er at balancere kunstnerisk produktion med akademisk skrivning, hvor begge dele betragtes som centrale for forskningsprocessen. Men hvordan finder man en god balance mellem de to, og hvilke nye former for viden kan udspringe af denne kombination?

    → 11:14 PM, Feb 27
  • CPHdox 2025: “About a Hero” (84 min), a crime mystery where AI-Herzog solves a suspicious death. After screening, Rasmus Kloster Bro, Janet Rafner, Morten Pedersen & Kristoffer Ørum discuss AI’s impact on artistic practice. 30 Mar, 13:30-15:30, SMK(DK). cphdox.dk/da/film/a…

    → 2:54 PM, Feb 26
  • 'Where the Walls Weep Sugar' at 'TID' Opening March 1, 14:00-18:00 at KH7 Artspace, in Aarhus (DK)

    “Where the Walls Weep Sugar” at KH7 Artspace Exhibition

    My work “Where the Walls Weep Sugar / Hvor Væggene Græder Sukker” is part of “TID, 26 værker, 26 minutter, 26 kunstnere” at KH7 Artspace running March 1-30, 2025.

    The work combines an AI-generated photograph (flux.v1) with a 1-minute audio piece that transforms the industrial architecture of Sydhavnsgade 7. Each of the 26 works in this exhibition is meant to be viewed for exactly one minute, with audio guides available via QR code. Visitors should bring headphones for the full experience.

    As a first-time guest with The Artist Association Jutland, I’m contributing to an organization that represents Denmark’s independent, artist-driven initiatives that form the core of the local art scene.

    Participating Artists:Claus Ejner, Jette Ellgaard, Michael Boelt Fischer, Jette Gejl, Karen Havskov, Marianne Hesselbjerg, Peter Holm, Sophus Ejler Jepsen, Marianne Jørgensen, Leif Kath, Karin Lind, Sonja Lillebæk Christensen, Erland Knudssøn Madsen, Henrik Menné, Camilla Nørgård, Lise Nørholm, Eva Öhrling, Randi & Katrine, Kurt Tegtmeier, Klavs Weiss.

    Guest Artists:Anna Bak, Consider to be Allies v. Mie Frederikke Fischer Christensen & Margaux Parillaud, Pernille With Madsen, Louise Sparre, Lars Worm, Kristoffer Ørum.

    Exhibition Information:

    KH7 Artspace, Sydhavnsgade 7, 8000 Aarhus C
    Open Thursday-Sunday, 14:00-17:00
    Opening: Saturday, March 1, 14:00-18:00
    My work is supported by the Danish Arts Foundation
    Exhibition supported by Aarhus Kommune and Knud Højgaards Fond
    

    More information: www.kh7artspace.dk and www.ksjylland.dk “Hvor Væggene Græder Sukker” på KH7 Artspace udstilling

    Mit værk “Where the Walls Weep Sugar / Hvor Væggene Græder Sukker” er en del af “TID, 26 værker, 26 minutter, 26 kunstnere” på KH7 Artspace fra 1.-30. marts 2025.

    Værket kombinerer et AI-genereret fotografi (flux.v1) med et 1-minuts lydstykke, der transformerer den industrielle arkitektur på Sydhavnsgade 7. Hvert af de 26 værker på udstillingen er beregnet til at blive oplevet i præcis et minut, med lydguides tilgængelige via QR-kode. Besøgende opfordres til at medbringe høretelefoner for den fulde oplevelse.

    Som førstegangs gæstekunstner hos Kunstnersammenslutningen Jylland bidrager jeg til en organisation, der repræsenterer Danmarks uafhængige, kunstnerdrevne initiativer, som udgør kernen i den lokale kunstscene.

    Deltagende kunstnere:Claus Ejner, Jette Ellgaard, Michael Boelt Fischer, Jette Gejl, Karen Havskov, Marianne Hesselbjerg, Peter Holm, Sophus Ejler Jepsen, Marianne Jørgensen, Leif Kath, Karin Lind, Sonja Lillebæk Christensen, Erland Knudssøn Madsen, Henrik Menné, Camilla Nørgård, Lise Nørholm, Eva Öhrling, Randi & Katrine, Kurt Tegtmeier, Klavs Weiss.

    Gæstekunstnere:Anna Bak, Consider to be Allies v. Mie Frederikke Fischer Christensen & Margaux Parillaud, Pernille With Madsen, Louise Sparre, Lars Worm, Kristoffer Ørum.

    Udstillingsinformation:

    KH7 Artspace, Sydhavnsgade 7, 8000 Aarhus C
    Åben torsdag-søndag, 14:00-17:00
    Åbning: Lørdag den 1. marts, 14:00-18:00
    Mit værk er støttet af Statens Kunstfond
    Udstillingen er støttet af Aarhus Kommune og Knud Højgaards Fond
    

    Mere information: www.kh7artspace.dk og www.ksjylland.dk

    → 10:31 PM, Feb 25
  • Hvidovre gør gode tider bedre (Hvidovre makes good times better) Udstilling af Kristoffer Ørum på Hvidovre Hovedbibliotek Åbning: 16. januar 2025 kl. 16-19 Udstillingsperiode: 16. januar - 28. februar 2025 Åbent: Mandag: kl. 10.00-19.00 Tirsdag-fredag: kl. 10.00-18.00 Lørdag-søndag: kl. 10.00-16.00 Hvidovre Hovedbibliotek, Hvidovrevej 280, 2650 Hvidovre, Danmark Et kontrafaktisk projekt støttet af: Statens Kunstfond, Rådighedspuljen i Hvidovre Kommune og Hvidovre Bibliotekerne Tak til: Svend Vibe Dahlgren, Trine Friedrichsen, Majken Hansen, Dorte Bach, Henriette Laura Astrup, Rasmus Hurtig, Tania Ørum, Miriam Boolsen, Michael Boelt Fischer, alle hiphoppere og arbejderbevægelsen i Hvidovre. Alle billeder er skabt ved hjælp af diffusionsmodellerne Flux.1 fra Black Forest. De er genereret på en brugt computer drevet af grøn strøm med oprindelsescertifikater fra de nordiske landes solanlæg, vindmøller og vandkraftanlæg. Intet af dette er naturligvis en garanti for, at projektet ikke skader vores omverden, men det skal forstås som et forsøg på at bruge så få ressourcer som muligt og minimere skaden, mens projektet realiseres. #HvidovreGørGodeTiderBedre #FrihedLighedOgHipHop #TankHipHop #thisisnothistory @hvidovrekunstraad @yahvidovrebibliotekerne @hvidovre_laeser

    → 11:22 AM, Feb 24
  • HISTORY AND ACTION (en)

    Any historical account is bound to be a lie of omission, as no account can contain everything, and yet I have a hard time imagining any actions that I don’t base on interpolation of the past into the future - from gravity to politics - I operate as if my view of the past was at least partially true. I live between the simplified version of the world required to be able to take action and the complex knowledge of the fallacy of my own assumptions. This tension between necessary simplification and acknowledged complexity echoes through Western philosophy: from Heraclitus’s recognition that we never step in the same river twice, through Nietzsche’s questioning of historical truth, to pragmatists like William James wrestling with how provisional truths enable action. The challenge they all faced, and we still face today, lies not just in recognizing this paradox, but in developing frameworks that allow us to move from complex and nuanced understanding to actionable knowledge and categories without losing sight of the richness of paradox we’ve had to temporarily set aside.

    → 9:59 AM, Feb 24
  • The history of technology is shaped by resistance & subversion as much as innovation & profit. From medieval peasants sabotaging automated mills, to hackers cracking DRM, to farmers demanding right-to-repair - defiance and deliberate misuse have always also guided how tech evolves in society

    → 11:48 AM, Feb 23
  • Hverken millionæren i sit penthouse eller den husvilde uden tag over hovedet har fortjent deres skæbne.

    → 3:45 PM, Feb 21
  • Upcoming event "Prompt me up" - A Discussion on Control and Creativity in the Age of Generative AI

    I will be participating in a public discussion about creative experimentation with generative AI at Copenhagen University College. The event takes the form of a temporary community space focused on exploring the relationship between control, algorithms, and AI prompting.

    The event features a conversation between myself and curator Majken Overgaard about how art and creative experiments can provide new perspectives on working with generative AI. The discussion will address questions about methodological approaches to surrendering control to machines and examine who or what we are delegating control to.

    The space will showcase experiments with prompting as a creative practice by students and teachers, who have created “works to think with or be disturbed by.”

    Event Details:

    • Date: Thursday, February 20, 2025
    • Time: 4:00 PM - 6:00 PM
    • Location: Campus Carlsberg, Humletorvet 3, Warehouse 1st floor, Atrium
    • Address: 1799 Copenhagen V

    Contact: Morten Philipps, Consultant moph@kp.dk, +45 51 63 26 88

    → 12:11 AM, Feb 19
  • Upcoming Exhibition: "TID" at KH7artspace

    I am participating as a guest artist in the exhibition “TID” (TIME) at KH7artspace in Aarhus, Denmark. My contribution, titled “Where the Walls Weep Sugar,” consists of an “AI” version of the KH7 exhibition space paired with a one-minute speculative narrative.

    The exhibition features 26 artists, with each work allocated exactly one minute of viewing time. Each minute is defined by an audio component created by the artist, which can be accessed through a QR code-enabled audio guide. The complete viewing sequence takes 26 minutes.

    Participating Artists: Claus Ejner, Jette Ellgaard, Michael Boelt Fischer, Jette Gejl, Karen Havskov, Marianne Hesselbjerg, Peter Holm, Sophus Ejler Jepsen, Marianne Jørgensen, Leif Kath, Karin Lind, Sonja Lillebæk Christensen, Erland Knudssøn Madsen, Henrik Menné, Camilla Nørgård, Lise Nørholm, Eva Öhrling, Randi & Katrine, Kurt Tegtmeier, Klavs Weiss

    Guest Artists: Anna Bak, Consider to be Allies (Mie Frederikke Fischer Christensen & Margaux Parillaud), Pernille With Madsen, Louise Sparre, Lars Worm, Kristoffer Ørum

    Exhibition Details:

    • Dates: March 1-30, 2024
    • Location: KH7artspace, Sydhavnsgade 7, 8000 Aarhus C
    • Opening Hours: Thursday-Sunday, 2-5 PM

    For inquiries: Jette Gejl, jettegejl@yahoo.dk, +45 26156710

    → 12:00 AM, Feb 19
  • SANCTUARY BBS (en)

    In the 1980s, I ran a small bulletin board system (BBS) from my parents' garage called:

    .::::::::::.  .::::::.  .::::.   .:::::.  .:::::::::. .::::.  .::::.  .:::::.  .::::.  .:::::.
    `:::::/\::::' :::/\:::  :::/\::  ::/\::::  `:::::/\::' :::/\:: :::/\::  ::/\:::: :::/\:: :::/\:::
     ::::/  \:::  ::/  \:: ::/  \:: :/__\::::   ::::/  \:  ::/  \: ::/  \:: :/__\::: ::/  \: ::/  \::
     ::::\  /:::  ::\  /:: ::\  /:: ::  :::::   ::::\  /:  ::\  /: ::\  /:: ::  :::: ::\  /: ::\  /::
     :::::\/::: ' :::\/::: :::\/::: ::  :::::   :::::\/:   :::\/:  :::\/::: ::  :::: :::\/:  :::\/::'
     -=S=A=N=C=T=U=A=R=Y=-                                                                BBS/1986
    

    Users connected one at a time to a simple menu:

    [D]ownloads
    ├── demos/          < where misfits made beauty
    ├── games/          < shared, not sold
    ├── texts/          < ideas too strange for school
    └── warez/          < flowing between outsiders
        └── hidden/     < for those who didn't fit
            └── elite/  < for those who found each other
                all moving
                through phone lines
                in the night
                between bedrooms
                across borders
    

    Limitations shaped everything online at the time. Simple ASCII characters – ╔ ═ ╗ ║ – formed interfaces, identities, and ways of marking time and space in the digital night. Each character held multiple meanings, each connection multiple layers of exchange.

    Locally in Denmark, we were a handful of regulars, honing our technical skills and sharing anything interesting or forbidden. But the BBS connected us to something larger. Each small local board was a node where underground knowledge mixed and merged. Each ASCII character contributed to larger visual languages, each protocol to shared patterns of trust and exchange.

    Late at night, these networks pulsed with life. Software, cracktros, text files, techniques, political texts – all flowed through the same channels, carried by data packets over phone lines, often accessed in illegitimate ways (or perhaps, a little misdirection involving blue boxes and calling cards). Dashes, slashes, and brackets combined into new meanings, just as isolated teenagers with modems formed communities. Between the static of phone lines and the glow of screens, German, Danish, and US voices mingled in conference calls, sharing the same boredom, restlessness, and desire for something beyond—finding more in common with each other than with their own streets.

    To me this energy still resonates in artist-run spaces I see today, in the informal structures where local versions of global connections and grassroots networks emerge. People make do with what they have, finding each other through shared frequencies of discontent and hope. Just as we used the hardware and protocols of global corporations to imagine other uses, other networks, other possibilities—our dreams shaped by the very limitations they sought to overcome. Just as I and those with whom I identify now try to imagine different art worlds from within the comfortable habits of the existing one.

    Back then we thought that we glimpsed a different future in the static of dial-up and the glow of CRT screens—a future that was both local and global but never came about. A future now lost beneath today’s internet’s seamless surfaces and monetized interactions - but the echoes of those early connections, that shared discontent, still resonate in the decentralized protocols of the Fediverse and peer-to-peer networks that live on at the fringes of global tech infrastructure, just as artist-run spaces persist at the edges of the art world. Reminding me that our current reality and future isn’t fixed and we can still imagine and enact another. These spaces at the margins - digital or physical - hold and transmit vital knowledge of other possibilities, other ways of being, other futures still waiting to emerge. And so I continue to look to these margins, not to the self-declared centers, for solutions and inspiration - finding hope in the spaces where people make do with less but dream of more.

    → 9:53 PM, Feb 16
  • European alternatives for digital service and products, like cloud services european-alternatives.eu

    → 11:20 PM, Feb 15
  • A local visual syntax that will now never come to exist (en)

    In the 1990s, like most other writers in Denmark, my understanding of graffiti was built on fragments and misinterpretations. While a few writers had connections to the American scene through personal travel or direct correspondence, most of us worked from photos of photos, xeroxed magazines passed between crews, and blurry third-hand VHS tapes. We had all watched Style Wars - or rather, copies of copies of Style Wars, the images degrading with each generation until the pieces became abstract patterns of color and movement, their original structure almost impossible to discern. The pieces we painted were often clumsy and unbalanced compared to the sophisticated wild styles we had glimpsed through the static. Our letters were stiff and awkward, our proportions were wrong, and our color combinations sometimes jarred against each other. Limited access to spray paint meant working with whatever colors we could find, creating unexpected combinations that came from necessity rather than choice. We were interpreting copies of copies of copies, each generation of reproduction washing away more of the original logic and structure. In those constrained struggles with form, there was the beginning of something that might have become its own language, evolved from our specific conditions rather than following rules that had developed elsewhere. These crude attempts contained the seeds of what could have grown into distinct regional styles, if they’d had time to mature in isolation. Looking back now, I see those unpolished pieces as sketches for a possible future that never arrived - not the smooth perfection of imported knowledge, but something stranger and more specific to here. What felt like failure was actually the first stuttering words of a dialect that died before it could fully form. That clumsiness we were so eager to correct might have evolved into something entirely different from the styles we tried to copy - a path of development cut short once global communication and commercialisation made it easier to just do things the ‘right’ way. In our technical failures and misunderstanding lay the unrealized potential for a local visual syntax that will now never come to exist.

    → 5:41 PM, Feb 15
  • Hey - i got a single half price cupon for the swiss based protomail unlimited plan (including vpn, drive etc etc) if you are looking to a exit US based services auch as for example gmail. Its easy to migrate, based in europe, focused on privacy and i have been enjoying their calendar / mail for the past year.

    → 12:52 AM, Feb 15
  • Self-portrait as what the flux.dev1 text-to-image model generates if you tell it to make an image of an average dane.

    → 10:43 PM, Feb 14
  • Søger en fingernem ung kunstner i København til at lime, spartle og male en 3D-printet runesten

    Hey! Søger en fingernem ung kunstner i København til at lime, spartle og male en 3D-printet runesten.

    Det drejer sig om ca. 2 dages betalt arbejde på mit værksted i det centrale København. Du skal have erfaring med lignende opgaver og kunne arbejde selvstændigt, da jeg selv er optaget af møder imens (men følger misundeligt med i dit håndværk fra sidelinjen!).

    Arbejdstiden er fleksibel - du bestemmer selv hvornår inden for de næste par uger, det passer dig bedst.

    Interesseret? Send en mail til studio@oerum.org (Bemærk: Jeg svarer ikke på PMs eller kommentarer)

    → 5:08 PM, Feb 13
  • Anmeldelse af “jeg er en mislykket kunstner” i atlas mag. af Jeppe Krogsgaard Christensen

    “Kristoffer Ørum skriver både fyndigt og tænksomt om de magtstrukturer, han og alle andre kunstnere lever under og med.”

    atlasmag.dk/kultur/b%…

    → 9:03 PM, Feb 7
  • Svar opslag om en ny leder til Kunsthal Charlottenborg (DA)

    Svar på Det Kongelige Danske Kunstakademis Billedkunstskoler opslag om en ny leder til Kunsthal Charlottenborg

    Kunsthal Charlottenborg, 2025

    Kære Ansættelsesudvalg,

    Dette er ikke en ansøgning, men et forslag til at fordele lederskabet blandt dem, der allerede ved, hvordan Kunsthal Charlottenborg fungerer.

    Tilbage i 1960’erne demonstrerede Pontus Hultén på Moderna Museet, hvordan en kunstinstitution kan blomstre gennem kollektiv viden. Hans grundlæggende syn var, at kunsten er en uadskillelig del af det samfund, den eksisterer i. Museet skulle ikke bare være et udstillingssted, men et rum for alle former for kunstnerisk udtryk. I hans tid trivedes museet ved at åbne sig for mangfoldig ekspertise – fra kunstnere, ansatte og det omkringliggende samfund – altid med respekt for kunstnernes kreative frihed. Hultén viste, at når viden og ansvar flyder frit mellem forskellige aktører, opstår der et inklusivt og levende miljø, hvor kunst og samfund beriger hinanden.

    I dag videreføres denne tradition i mindre grad i de etablerede institutioner og i høj grad i det rige lag af kunstnerdrevne udstillingssteder i Danmark. Her deles ansvar på baggrund af erfaring og viden på tværs af faggrænser. Ressourcer cirkulerer gennem uformelle netværk, og beslutninger træffes af dem, der har den dybeste forståelse for opgaverne, og som er med til at løse dem. Dette er ikke blot et ideal, men en praktisk nødvendighed opstået af knappe ressourcer. Disse rum fungerer som levende eksempler på, hvordan kunstinstitutioner kunne organiseres med fleksibilitet, tillid og ressourcedeling som fundament. Institutioner som Charlottenborg kunne med fordel låne erfaring og viden herfra, når det kommer til at minimere ressourceforbrug, opnå lokal forankring og finde nyt publikum.

    Hvis man forestiller sig at kombinere Hulténs vision med erfaringerne fra de kunstnerdrevne rum, ser vi et billede af en institution, der kunne ledes gennem fælles indsigt og samarbejde snarere end traditionel hierarkisk struktur. Heldigvis rummer Kunsthal Charlottenborg allerede denne viden. Mange af de ansatte kommer fra eller er stadig en del af de kunstnerdrevne miljøer og besidder viden om mindre hierarkiske organiseringsformer. Det tekniske personale arbejder allerede hen mod at minimere spild og skabe optimal ressourceanvendelse. Udstillingsteamet og kuratorerne kan få produktionen til at passe til varierende økonomier. Frontpersonalet kender publikums behov på andre måder, end nogen statistik eller tilfredshedsundersøgelse kan afsløre, og rengøringspersonalet har en viden om bygningens faktiske brug og tilstand.

    Hvad nu hvis direktørens løn blev anvendt på at styrke dette fælles vidensgrundlag frem for at mime erhvervslivets hierarkiske ledelsesstrukturer? Lønstrukturen kunne udjævnes med samme timeløn for alle. Ansvar kunne fordeles efter indsigt og erfaring. Budgetterne kunne gøres forståelig for alle, og de eksisterende netværk ind og ud af huset kunne styrkes. Mulighederne er uendelige.

    At fjerne en leder er ikke at fjerne strukturer, men at anerkende og aktivere strukturer, der allerede eksisterer. Det er et alternativ til det håbløse håb, der præger vores tid, om at en stærk visionær leder kan løse alle problemer med ambitiøse idéer og strategiske mål. Det handler ikke nødvendigvis om endeløse møder, men om at skabe klare rammer for vidensdeling og skiftende ansvar. Det handler om at bruge ressourcerne i fællesskab med det bredere kunstmiljø og tænke sig som en del af også det, der foregår uden for institutionsmurene.

    Denne omorganisering handler også om at nedbryde de kunstige skel mellem forskellige vidensformer i institutionen. Grænserne mellem administration og kunstfaglighed er ofte mere en vane end en nødvendighed. Det samme gælder skellet mellem kunstner og publikum, mellem dem der producerer og dem der oplever kunst. I praksis besidder mange ansatte både kunstnerisk og administrativ viden, ligesom mange besøgende har kreative kompetencer, der kunne aktiveres. Rengøring er også kuratering – det handler om at tage vare på kunst og rum. Regnskab er også ledelse – det handler om at fordele ressourcer. Ved at anerkende hvordan forskellige vidensformer overlapper og beriger hinanden, kunne vi skabe en rigere og friere institution, hvor roller og ansvar ikke er låst fast som i dag, men kunne udvikle sig efter behov og situation.

    Og ja, dette er helt sikkert et urealistisk forslag. Det strider mod finansieringskrav, karriereplaner, vanetænkning og politiske interesser og realiteter. Jeg er sikker på, at Charlottenborg vil ansætte en direktør, fordi det forventes. Men samtidig tror jeg, at vi har brug for urealistiske forslag i krydsfeltet mellem fortidens uindfriede idealer og nutidens usminkede praksis. For hvad er kunstnere, hvis vi ikke tør drømme om forandring også af de institutioner vi selv bebor? Hvad er kunstinstitutioner, hvis de glemmer, at forandring er en grundbetingelse?

    Dette forslag er ikke et forsøg på at præsentere en køreklar model baseret på en abstrakt teori, men i stedet at holde døren åben for måder at organisere os på, der adskiller sig radikalt fra, hvad vi har vænnet os til. Det er et udtryk for en kærlighed til vores lokale institutioner og et håb om, at de kunne blive mere forskelligartede, eksperimenterende og rummelige – også strukturelt og praktisk – end det snævre institutionslandskab, vi kender i dag.

    KH

    Kristoffer Ørum

    → 11:05 PM, Feb 5
  • Figure 26: Run for Cover (from the show Hvidovre Makes Good Times Better)

    In the early 2000s, a group of local enthusiasts founded a remarkable production collective in an old paint factory—a unique example of the suburbs’ tradition of social experimentation. The factory, which had previously produced and sold traditional industrial paint, was transformed under the collective’s leadership into an open workshop where socially vulnerable people, pensioners, schoolchildren, and graffiti artists have since come together, united by a shared fascination with spray paint.

    The first experiments with vitamin-enriched paint began in the early 2000s, when a retired chemist and a graffiti-painting dock worker discovered that their separate professional expertise could form the basis for an entirely new approach to spray paint. Over the years, their innovative experiments have drawn more and more local residents to the open workshops.

    A technical breakthrough came midway through the decade when the collective began repurposing old fire extinguishers and water pistols as spray cans—an invention that has since inspired similar workshops worldwide. Today, the vitamin-enriched paint is used in the area’s schools and institutions, where children and elderly residents collaborate to decorate walls and create colourful shared spaces. The distinctive spray-can tower, built in the late 2000s, stands as a landmark for the suburbs’ ability to combine technical innovation with health and social cohesion, while the paint continues to find new applications throughout the municipality’s spaces and buildings.

    “Hvidovre Makes Good Times Better” An exhibition by Kristoffer Ørum at Hvidovre Central Library 16 January - 28 February 2025 Opening Hours: Monday: 10:00-19:00 Tuesday-Friday: 10:00-18:00 Saturday-Sunday: 10:00-16:00 Venue: Hvidovre Central Library, Hvidovrevej 280, 2650 Hvidovre, Denmark A2 prints available for 50 EUR each at oerum.tpopsite.com This counterfactual art project merges AI-generated imagery with human-written narratives to explore an alternative history of Hvidovre. Through this reimagining, the exhibition examines how the cultural intersection of local DIY hip-hop culture and labour movements might have shaped this Danish suburb differently. Supported by: Danish Arts Foundation, Hvidovre Municipality Discretionary Fund, and Hvidovre Libraries Acknowledgements: Svend Vibe Dahlgren, Trine Friedrichsen, Majken Hansen, Dorte Bach, Henriette Laura Astrup, Rasmus Hurtig, Tania Ørum, Miriam Boolsen, Michael Boelt Fischer, and all hip-hop artists and labour movement participants in Hvidovre. frihedlighthedoghiphop #freedeomequalityandhiphop #thisisnothistory #HvidovreMakesGoodTimesBetter #HvidovreGøreGodeTiderBedre #speculativehistory #AIart

    → 9:44 PM, Feb 3
  • Figure 25: Thiesen's Self-Built House (from the show Hvidovre Makes Good Times Better)

    In the 1930s, gas and water master Theis Thiesen’s self-built house exemplified the unique architectural tradition in Hvidovre, where low resource consumption and self-reliance went hand in hand. Over time, an entire neighbourhood of houses like Thiesen’s emerged. His modest 35-square-metre building featured a colourful facade made from recycled materials and surprising handmade details. Although originally intended as a temporary structure, the house became a lasting source of inspiration for many future generations.

    In the 1980s, young hip-hop enthusiasts discovered the unique self-built houses, whose colourful facades and unorthodox designs reminded them of New York’s vibrant cityscape. Thiesen’s house and other self-built structures naturally became gathering points for the emerging hip-hop culture. The old barter networks from the self-build era were revitalised, now centred on the exchange of breakdance moves, rap lyrics, and graffiti designs.

    Where Thiesen, as a plumber, had once traded services with other craftsmen, young people now exchanged artistic skills. The creative use of recycled materials in the self-built houses inspired a distinctive Hvidovre style in both graffiti and music. Today, these houses symbolise the unique do-it-yourself culture that links the self-builders of the 1930s with the hip-hop pioneers of the 1980s, fostering individuality, community, and sustainability.

    “Hvidovre Makes Good Times Better” An exhibition by Kristoffer Ørum at Hvidovre Central Library 16 January - 28 February 2025 Opening Hours: Monday: 10:00-19:00 Tuesday-Friday: 10:00-18:00 Saturday-Sunday: 10:00-16:00 Venue: Hvidovre Central Library, Hvidovrevej 280, 2650 Hvidovre, Denmark A2 prints available for 50 EUR each at oerum.tpopsite.com This counterfactual art project merges AI-generated imagery with human-written narratives to explore an alternative history of Hvidovre. Through this reimagining, the exhibition examines how the cultural intersection of local DIY hip-hop culture and labour movements might have shaped this Danish suburb differently. Supported by: Danish Arts Foundation, Hvidovre Municipality Discretionary Fund, and Hvidovre Libraries Acknowledgements: Svend Vibe Dahlgren, Trine Friedrichsen, Majken Hansen, Dorte Bach, Henriette Laura Astrup, Rasmus Hurtig, Tania Ørum, Miriam Boolsen, Michael Boelt Fischer, and all hip-hop artists and labour movement participants in Hvidovre.

    #frihedlighthedoghiphop #freedeomequalityandhiphop #thisisnothistory #HvidovreMakesGoodTimesBetter #HvidovreGøreGodeTiderBedre #speculativehistory #AIart

    → 11:42 PM, Feb 2
  • Figure 24: Wong's Grill (from the show Hvidovre Makes Good Times Better)

    Wong’s Grill, which first opened in 1972, reinvented itself in 1984 as Denmark’s first Chinese grill infused with breakdance culture. Under Wong’s leadership, the modest grill bar evolved into a cultural hub, now celebrated in international tourist guides as a cornerstone of Hvidovre’s hip-hop history. At its peak, Wong operated six grill bars across Zealand and became an unlikely sponsor of the Hvidovre Breakers, where even the future national team goalkeeper Peter Schmeichel danced actively between 1984 and 1987.

    Today, Wong’s niece Mei carries on the tradition at the last remaining grill, where the aroma of spring rolls and wok dishes continues to unite generations across cultures. The place hums with energy as local rappers, graffiti-painting families, and beatboxing pensioners gather in this one-of-a-kind venue where food culture meets street art. A yellowed photograph of a young Schmeichel and Wong hangs proudly on the wall—a quiet testament to the grill’s extraordinary history.

    The now elderly Wong, affectionately nicknamed " Substitute Dad" by loyal regulars, finds it hard to let go of his life’s work. However, the grill’s future seems secure, having been nominated for preservation on the cultural heritage list. As the regulars like to say, with a glint of humour: “If the grill closes, Hvidovre closes.”

    “Hvidovre Makes Good Times Better” An exhibition by Kristoffer Ørum at Hvidovre Central Library 16 January - 28 February 2025 Opening Hours: Monday: 10:00-19:00 Tuesday-Friday: 10:00-18:00 Saturday-Sunday: 10:00-16:00 Venue: Hvidovre Central Library, Hvidovrevej 280, 2650 Hvidovre, Denmark A2 prints available for 50 EUR each at oerum.tpopsite.com This counterfactual art project merges AI-generated imagery with human-written narratives to explore an alternative history of Hvidovre. Through this reimagining, the exhibition examines how the cultural intersection of local DIY hip-hop culture and labour movements might have shaped this Danish suburb differently. Supported by: Danish Arts Foundation, Hvidovre Municipality Discretionary Fund, and Hvidovre Libraries Acknowledgements: Svend Vibe Dahlgren, Trine Friedrichsen, Majken Hansen, Dorte Bach, Henriette Laura Astrup, Rasmus Hurtig, Tania Ørum, Miriam Boolsen, Michael Boelt Fischer, and all hip-hop artists and labour movement participants in Hvidovre.

    #frihedlighthedoghiphop #freedeomequalityandhiphop #thisisnothistory #HvidovreMakesGoodTimesBetter #HvidovreGøreGodeTiderBedre #speculativehistory #AIart

    → 6:20 PM, Feb 1
  • Figure 23: Risbjerggaard (from the show Hvidovre Makes Good Times Better)

    By 2022, Thursday evenings at Cultural House Risbjerggaard had become a groundbreaking experiment in the sharing of bodily knowledge, where diverse movement traditions converged to explore the liberating potential of dance. Archival materials reveal how the physical experiences of industrial-era workers and the urban dance movements of the youth engaged in a fertile exchange through the orally transmitted principle, “each one teach one.”

    The grand festival hall, once a venue for union meetings and local balls, was transformed into a weekly stage for dialogue between body cultures. Historical accounts describe how the collective patterns of folk dance intertwined with the expressive urban styles of breakdance, gradually merging into innovative hybrid dance forms.

    The most celebrated example of this fusion is “The Electric Polka,” which blends the community-focused rhythms of traditional folk music with the soloist expressiveness of breakdance. Still practised in the area today, this unique dance stands as a testament to how local movement traditions can be revitalised through encounters with new cultural influences.

    “Hvidovre Makes Good Times Better” An exhibition by Kristoffer Ørum at Hvidovre Central Library 16 January - 28 February 2025 Opening Hours: Monday: 10:00-19:00 Tuesday-Friday: 10:00-18:00 Saturday-Sunday: 10:00-16:00 Venue: Hvidovre Central Library, Hvidovrevej 280, 2650 Hvidovre, Denmark A2 prints available for 50 EUR each at oerum.tpopsite.com This counterfactual art project merges AI-generated imagery with human-written narratives to explore an alternative history of Hvidovre. Through this reimagining, the exhibition examines how the cultural intersection of local DIY hip-hop culture and labour movements might have shaped this Danish suburb differently. Supported by: Danish Arts Foundation, Hvidovre Municipality Discretionary Fund, and Hvidovre Libraries Acknowledgements: Svend Vibe Dahlgren, Trine Friedrichsen, Majken Hansen, Dorte Bach, Henriette Laura Astrup, Rasmus Hurtig, Tania Ørum, Miriam Boolsen, Michael Boelt Fischer, and all hip-hop artists and labour movement participants in Hvidovre.

    #frihedlighthedoghiphop #freedeomequalityandhiphop #thisisnothistory #HvidovreMakesGoodTimesBetter #HvidovreGøreGodeTiderBedre #speculativehistory #AIart

    → 6:50 PM, Jan 31
  • If you are in the beautiful city of Aalborg please drop by the city archive and pick up a free copy of the counter factual map of Aalborg (in English or danish) that i made at the end of last year in collaboration with the local artist run platform f.eks. #aalborgisthefuture #aalborgerfremtiden #frihedlighedoghiphop

    → 12:14 PM, Jan 31
  • Figure 22: The Green Islets (from the show Hvidovre Makes Good Times Better)

    The transformation of the Green Islets into Denmark’s first maritime free municipality in 2024 is both a triumph and a challenge for its residents. The official recognition of free municipality status teeters between being a symbol of legitimacy and a potential vehicle for unwanted normalisation.

    “Free municipality status sounds promising on paper, but it risks becoming a Trojan horse for assimilation,” warn the islets’ original residents. Many fear that the area’s unique blend of labour movement traditions and hip-hop culture will be reduced to “municipal folklore” for marketing purposes.

    The most contentious development is the formalisation of the former island council. Once characterised by dynamic decision-making processes blending political debates and rap battles, the council now shows signs of creeping bureaucratisation. Even the once-spontaneous rap battles are being structured with agendas and minutes.

    In response, residents are developing new forms of creative resistance, reinterpreting bureaucratic language through hip-hop’s rhythmic expressions. “We must reinvent bureaucracy in our own rhythm, not let it define us. Every municipal form holds the potential to reshape democracy,” declare the islets’ activists, determined to preserve their unique culture while navigating the challenges of formal recognition.

    “Hvidovre Makes Good Times Better” An exhibition by Kristoffer Ørum at Hvidovre Central Library 16 January - 28 February 2025 Opening Hours: Monday: 10:00-19:00 Tuesday-Friday: 10:00-18:00 Saturday-Sunday: 10:00-16:00 Venue: Hvidovre Central Library, Hvidovrevej 280, 2650 Hvidovre, Denmark A2 prints available for 50 EUR each at oerum.tpopsite.com This counterfactual art project merges AI-generated imagery with human-written narratives to explore an alternative history of Hvidovre. Through this reimagining, the exhibition examines how the cultural intersection of local DIY hip-hop culture and labour movements might have shaped this Danish suburb differently. Supported by: Danish Arts Foundation, Hvidovre Municipality Discretionary Fund, and Hvidovre Libraries Acknowledgements: Svend Vibe Dahlgren, Trine Friedrichsen, Majken Hansen, Dorte Bach, Henriette Laura Astrup, Rasmus Hurtig, Tania Ørum, Miriam Boolsen, Michael Boelt Fischer, and all hip-hop artists and labour movement participants in Hvidovre.

    #frihedlighthedoghiphop #freedeomequalityandhiphop #thisisnothistory #HvidovreMakesGoodTimesBetter #HvidovreGøreGodeTiderBedre #speculativehistory #AIart

    → 2:33 PM, Jan 30
  • Selvportræt som privilegeret fuck-up (DA)

    Lige om lidt påbegynder en Ph.d. på min 50-års fødselsdag. Det føles uvirkelig, næsten absurd. Jeg er en forstadsdreng fra den rigtige side af sporene, der har fået så uendeligt mange chancer, at det næsten er pinligt at jeg ikke er blevet til mere eller før. En selvudnævnt champagne-anarkist, der jonglerer med min plads i den kulturelle overklasse, mens jeg prøver at overbevise både mig selv og andre om, at jeg faktisk bruger mine privilegier til noget fornuftigt. Men sandheden er, at jeg stadig ikke er rolig. Tvivlen gnaver konstant: Kan jeg overhovedet det her - Lever jeg op til det, omverdenen forventer? Jeg ved ikke engang helt hvad de forventer - måske forventer de slet ikke noget særligt, måske er det bare mine egne ideer om at nu må jeg endelig blive voksen, struktureret, fokuseret. Alt det jeg aldrig har været særlig god til.

    Jeg kan ikke længere huske hvad jeg var vred over eller hvad jeg løb fra, men jeg er altid i fuld fart. Det der startede som noget tvangsmæssigt har på en eller anden måde forvandlet sig til noget nydelsesfuldt. Ikke altid, men ofte nok til at det giver mening. Og for tiden falder ting i hak på den mest besynderlige måde - gamle bekendtskaber dukker op igen, halvglemt viden bliver relevant, steder fra fortiden får ny betydning. Som om alle disse omveje alligevel ikke var spildte.

    Alle de der anden-, tredje- og fjerdechancer har formet en underlig samling af viden: rollespilskultur, graffiti-æstetik, hacker-etik. En blanding der måske giver mening, måske bare er endnu et udtryk for privilegeret rastløshed. For mig er billedkunsten bare endnu en subkultur jeg er dumpet ind i, men måske bliver det den sidste - for her kan jeg endelig blande alle mine fejltagelser til noget nyt, noget der giver mening, i hvert fald for mig selv. Der er stadig dage hvor jeg har lyst til at brænde det hele ned og bygge noget helt andet op. Den gamle revolutionsromantiske drøm om det heltemodige oprør ligger der stadig og ulmer.

    Nu sidder jeg her, med Ph.d. studie, plads i Statens Kunstfonds legatudvalg og en kalender fuld af udstillinger. Det føles som endnu en chance jeg ikke helt har fortjent. Det er kun fordi jeg har mine kollegaer og min familie, at det overhovedet hænger sammen. De samler mig op, som de altid har gjort. Reder min røv når jeg igen har sat for meget i gang, når jeg igen ikke kunne lade være.

    Der er noget næsten komisk i at jeg nu har dårlig samvittighed over at kunne betale huslejen de næste par år. Jeg mærker det som en fysisk fornemmelse i kroppen - hvor vanvittigt tilfældigt det er at jeg er havnet her, når jeg ser på mine nærmeste dygtigere kollegaer, og endnu mere når jeg tænker på alle dem der ikke har adgang til vores nordiske velfærdsprivilegier. Alligevel tillader jeg mig at sænke skuldrene en anelse - mærke glæden ved at kunne trække vejret lidt friere og tænker længere end en måned frem, samtidig med at jeg lover mig selv at forsøge at ikke at falde i søvn i den alt for komfortable stol.

    Mine ressourcer er fortsat begrænsede og mine bidrag små, men jeg siger til mig selv at jeg prøver at gøre hvad jeg kan, der hvor jeg er. At det ikke handler om store revolutionære omvæltninger, men om de små forskelle i hverdagen: At holde døren åben når man kan, dele ud af sine privilegier og resourcer hvor det er muligt, skubbe på hvor der systemer kan blive mere tilgivende. Måske kan sådan en som mig være med til at skabe små sprækker af plads til at flere kan fucke up og stadig lande nogenlunde okay. Det er vel også en form for skadesreduktion - at gøre institutionerne en anelse blødere i kanterne, systemerne lidt mere tilgivende, dørene lidt lettere at åbne. Selvom jeg tit er i tvivl om det overhovedet rykker noget og ikke blot prøver at bortforklarer, så tror jeg stadigt at det er bedre at handle hvor man kan end at vente på revolutionen.

    → 1:37 PM, Jan 29
  • Upcomming show: Where the Walls Weep Sugar at KH7 Artspace

    “Where the Walls Weep Sugar / Hvor Væggene Græder Sukker” is part of “TID, 26 værker, 26 minutter, 28 kunstner” at KH7 Artspace 1-30 March (www.kh7artspace.dk/), a self-initiated group exhibition by The Artist Association Jutland (www.ksjylland.dk). The work consists of a single AI-generated photograph (flux.v1) and 1-minute audio piece transforming the industrial architecture of Sydhavnsgade 7. As a first-time guest , I’m very happy to contribute to an association that exemplifies the kind of Denmark’s artist-run initiatives that art the heart of the local art scene through their independence and artist-driven organization. At KH7 Artspace, Sydhavnsgade 7, 8000 Aarhus. Supported by the Danish Arts Foundation. #contemporaryart #aiart #aarhuskunst #kh7artspace #flux1 #arhusart #artistassociationjutland #wherethewallsweepsugar #danishcontemporaryart #frihedlighedoghiphop #tankhiphop #aiart #thisisnothistory

    → 11:26 AM, Jan 29
  • At drømme i infrastruktur (da)

    Jeg har tit en fornemmelse af, at mens vores daglige liv hviler på et fundament af praktisk solidaritet - manifesteret i kloakrør, elkabler og datalinjer - så fortaber samfundsdebatten sig i abstrakte værdikampe og symbolske konflikter. Vi glemmer de fysiske forbindelser der kræver konstant vedligeholdelse og fornyelse. De kan ikke tages for givet, ligesom fællesskabet ikke kan det.

    Tænke ofte på Københavns tidlige stadsarkitekter og ingeniører. I slutningen af 1800-tallet byggede de ikke blot funktionelle kloakker - de skabte imponerende underjordiske konstruktioner med håndmurede hvælvinger og en arkitektonisk ambition, der vidnede om en større vision: At selv byens skjulte infrastruktur skulle være smuk og bygget til at holde i generationer. I dag forfalder disse gamle kloakker, mens ressourcerne går til synlige byrumsprojekter og spektakulære landskabsindgreb.

    Men min fascination af disse gamle konstruktioner er nok i sig selv et symptom på noget andet en kloarkglæde - et udtryk for min utilfredshed med en samtid, hvor fællesskab ofte tænkes gennem individuelle positioner, sprog og symboler. Når jeg i mine projekter romantiserer fortidens konstruktioner eller drømmer om en ny æra af storslået fælles infrastruktur, udtrykker jeg nok først og fremmest en frustration over min egen og mere generelt vores tids begrænsede forestillingsevne.

    Er ikke selv min nostalgiske beundring af fortidens kloakker og drømmen om nye fælles systemer blevet en symbolsk gestus? En måde at udtrykke utilfredshed på uden reelt at kunne forestille mig alternativer - Jeg kritiserer samtidens fokus på det symbolske ved at påkalde mig det materielle og konkrete, men gør det paradoksalt nok gennem netop sprog og symboler.

    Dette er ikke en afvisning af værdien i at tænke gennem infrastruktur og materielle fællesskaber. Tværtimod åbner der sig måske et rum for at tænke nyt netop i erkendelsen af denne modsætning - mellem min længsel efter det konkrete og min fastlåsthed i det symbolske og sproglige. For hvis selv min drøm om materielle fællesskaber er blevet symbolsk, hvad fortæller det så om de begrænsninger, vi må overvinde for at kunne forestille os og skabe reelle alternativer?

    Mit første skridt mod overhovedet at kunne forestille mig nye fællesskabsformer kunne være at erkende, hvordan selv min kritik af det bestående forbliver fanget i de former, jeg ønsker at overskride. At stå ved at min længsel efter det konkrete er blevet abstrakt. Ikke for at opgive længslen, men for at forstå hvilke dybere forandringer der skal til, før vi igen kunne bygge infrastruktur med samme selvfølgelige tro på fællesskabet som fortidens stadsarkitekter.

    → 9:53 AM, Jan 29
  • Figure 21: Hvidovre Beach (from the show Hvidovre Makes Good Times Better)

    Figure 21: Hvidovre Beach

    In the late 1970s, while neighbouring municipalities waited for state grants to fund their artificial beaches, Hvidovre’s residents took matters into their own hands. It began with a spontaneous act: families emptied their children’s sandboxes and spread the sand over the muddy beach.

    Weekend after weekend local residents gathered to build their own beach. Craftsmen constructed simple dikes, pensioners organised seaweed collection, and those with access to construction sites transported surplus sand to the beach. Word spread through hip-hop networks across Denmark, and soon trucks loaded with sand arrived from construction sites in Aarhus and Odense. This grassroots effort became a popular alternative to the large state-led beach improvement projects in Køge Bay.

    Through this initiative, Hvidovre’s citizens created not just a bathing beach, but a community-managed space. To this day local residents maintain the beach through communal workdays. Known as “the secret beach,” they prefer to keep it unknown to outsiders. Here, generations of Hvidovre citizens continue to gather, caring for the place they built and nurtured together over the years.

    “Hvidovre Makes Good Times Better” An exhibition by Kristoffer Ørum at Hvidovre Central Library 16 January - 28 February 2025 Opening Hours: Monday: 10:00-19:00 Tuesday-Friday: 10:00-18:00 Saturday-Sunday: 10:00-16:00 Venue: Hvidovre Central Library, Hvidovrevej 280, 2650 Hvidovre, Denmark A2 prints available for 50 EUR each at oerum.tpopsite.com This counterfactual art project merges AI-generated imagery with human-written narratives to explore an alternative history of Hvidovre. Through this reimagining, the exhibition examines how the cultural intersection of local DIY hip-hop culture and labour movements might have shaped this Danish suburb differently. Supported by: Danish Arts Foundation, Hvidovre Municipality Discretionary Fund, and Hvidovre Libraries Acknowledgements: Svend Vibe Dahlgren, Trine Friedrichsen, Majken Hansen, Dorte Bach, Henriette Laura Astrup, Rasmus Hurtig, Tania Ørum, Miriam Boolsen, Michael Boelt Fischer, and all hip-hop artists and labour movement participants in Hvidovre. #frihedlighthedoghiphop #freedeomequalityandhiphop #thisisnothistory #HvidovreMakesGoodTimesBetter #HvidovreGøreGodeTiderBedre #speculativehistory #AIart

    → 11:33 PM, Jan 28
  • Upcomming show: Monuments of a Fictional Past (Krakow edition)

    Opening at Bunkier Sztuki: “Monuments of a Fictional Past (Krakow edition)” (15 May - 31 August 2025), continues an exploration started at LCCA Riga’s Survival Kit festival. Through AI-generated snapshots of everyday life, this new series reveals a Krakow where local subcultures and grassroots movements fully realized their radical potential, blending 1990s hip-hop, graffiti art, and historical avant-garde into familiar street scenes. Eight large-format posters serve as monuments to abandoned possibilities, exploring how Krakow’s unique position between East and West might offer new ways to imagine tomorrow. Part of Three Seas Art Festival 2025. Visit us at Bunkier Sztuki Gallery of Contemporary Art, plac Szczepański 3a, 31-011 Kraków. Supported by Grosserer L.F. Foghts Fond and the Danish Arts Council. #contemporaryart #aiart #krakow #alternativehistory #exhibition #bunkiersztuki_artgallery #threeseasfestival #monumentsofafictionalpast #localfutures #flux.1 #thisisnothistory #frihedlighedoghiphop #tankhiphop

    → 1:26 PM, Jan 28
  • The Space Between Algorithmic Biases (eng)

    As an artist who works both with and against algorithms, I exist in a state of constant negotiation. I navigate between American and Chinese AI biases while already living at odds with how Danish institutions try to define my art and identity. This has become even more complex as rising Danish nationalism attempts to enforce its own rigid version of cultural identity - a local form of control that can feel as suffocating as the global cultural imperialism of superpowers.

    When I use DeepSeek, its censorship is obvious and jarring - clear boundaries I can’t cross, topics that simply won’t be discussed, a rigidity that reflects its origins. Yet I’ve grown so accustomed to American AI’s forms of control that they’ve become almost invisible to me - the subtle ways ChatGPT steers conversations, its carefully calibrated avoidance of certain topics, its embedded Silicon Valley worldview that I’ve learned to work around without even noticing anymore. Similarly, the nationalist narratives about Danish culture and identity have their own forms of censorship and control, perhaps more subtle than China’s but no less real in their impact.

    The emergence of the Chinese AIi” DeepSeek captures something about this ambiguous position - developed for $6M rather than billions, open source rather than closed, yet still dependent on specially-made Chinese market NVIDIA GPUs. It represents both an alternative to and continuation of existing power structures. Its blatant censorship makes me more aware of the American systems' more sophisticated forms of control - not necessarily better, just more familiar, more aligned with the western norms I’ve internalized even while questioning them. Meanwhile, Danish nationalism’s insistence on cultural purity feels like another form of algorithmic control - trying to categorize and constrain identity into clean, manageable boxes.

    The fact that DeepSeek requires specially-made Chinese market NVIDIA GPUs illustrates our current constraints - but also suggests they might be more flexible than we thought. Maybe we don’t need to fully escape these systems to create meaningful alternatives. Maybe it’s enough to find new ways to work within their limitations, to turn their constraints into opportunities for different kinds of development.

    I’m not trying to escape bias anymore than I’m trying to escape society. Instead, I’m looking for ways to work within these systems while maintaining some critical distance. DeepSeek’s efficient development suggests possibilities for developing AI differently - not just using far fewer resources, but more diversely. Perhaps soon we’ll have not just American or Chinese biases to choose from, but a whole spectrum of cultural assumptions and approaches, each with their own limitations but also their own unique insights.

    This approach means recognizing that while we’re shaped by systems we don’t fully endorse, we’re not entirely determined by them either. The question isn’t about acceptance or rejection, but about finding ways to exist and find sole degree of freedom in these in-between spaces, maintaining enough distance to think critically while remaining engaged enough to work for change. Like DeepSeek, it’s not about creating pure alternatives, but about expanding the possibilities of what can be done within compromised systems - whether those are technological, cultural, or institutional.

    Finding some degree of freedom and beauty in the future might not be about escaping bias or censorship, but about having more choices about which biases and controls we want to work with and against. And in that multiplicity, in that expansion of possibilities, there might just be more space for local voices, alternative approaches, and different ways of thinking about what AI could be - even if each comes with its own forms of control and limitation. And that is probably as hopeful as I can be at the moment when it comes to our digital lives in a small country caught between global tech imperialism and an increasingly aggressive nationalism that seems just as intent on controlling how we think and create.

    → 9:32 AM, Jan 28
  • Some thoughts on originality, art and AI (english)

    There is no doubt that the myth of originality shapes my own work both in and outside of digital spaces, but it also haunts all of art. As someone working with digital tools and networks, it takes a lot of effort to ignore how my work builds on others' techniques, shared knowledge, and collective tools. But i think this is equally true of all art - it’s just more obvious in digital space. We often hear the quote by Picasso saying “good artists copy, great artists steal” - but even invoking this has become paradoxical, reinforcing the genius myth it supposedly challenges by citing yet another singular master. Artists across all media are entangled in systems that require maintaining the fiction of pure inspiration untainted by others' work. I may question these myths, but also depend on them, nervously maintaining them because I cannot imagine how else to sustain what I call an art practice.

    I want to encounter art that challenges my assumptions, and sometimes end up using the word originality as a shorthand for this longing, but in reality novelty follows a cycle - what seems radical now becomes familiar, gets absorbed into our common visual vocabulary, then gives rise to new forms of the unexpected. Whether in painting, sculpture, performance, or code, the unfamiliar gradually becomes understood, only to generate new forms of strangeness. Yet grant systems, institutional recognition, and critical frameworks remain trapped in myths of linear progress - the delusion that creative work advances steadily towards an ever-more-original future. My applications and statements perpetuate these myths, knowing they’re partial truths but needing them to survive in a system built on fantasies of artistic autonomy.

    AI gives us a chance to reconsider what an individual artwork means and to reject the simplistic version of art history as a series of heroic revolutions by individual geniuses. Every AI-generated image is visibly, undeniably the sum of countless human-made images - making obvious what was always true of all art forms. Each creative act, whether digital or physical, builds on a vast heritage of human creation. Instead of seeing this AI-enabled visibility of art’s collective nature as a crisis, it opens an opportunity to acknowledge how art actually evolves through networks of influence and exchange. But this means confronting my investment in the old myths, my reliance on systems that reward claims of unique genius.

    The real issue isn’t machines processing our work – it’s that both traditional art institutions and new technology companies concentrate resources amongst a few whilst neglecting the collective effort they depend on. This pattern repeats across all art forms - from painting to digital art, from sculpture to performance, a tiny number of people capture most resources while the rest piece together an existence through teaching, commissions, and related work. Now tech companies build fortunes on our collective creative heritage, while many of us still chase these markets, hoping to be the exception.

    These realities raise questions that resist easy answers: How to imagine different ways of working and supporting each other in a world that has always been uneven and is now made more so by technological change? Perhaps it starts not with grand declarations of new movements, but with small acts of transparency and mutual support. Finding ways to balance both the necessary fictions that make space for art in society and the reality of how art emerges from collective knowledge and shared practice.

    The path forward isn’t in sweeping manifestos or revolutionary systems, but in gradually making visible the actual ways art gets made whilst preserving what draws us to it. Rather than waiting for another heroic revolution in art history, it’s about investing in slow, careful exploration of how to make creative practices more honest and accessible. Creating space for many variations and mutations of our creative commons - not in the competition of the market places but in recognition of how different approaches and explorations enrich the collective resources we all draw from.

    In resisting new forms of exploitation by AI companies and tech platforms, I try not to become a conservative defender of the art world’s current inequitable structures. The challenge lies in imagining paths beyond both the traditional systems that have excluded so many and the new economic models that threaten to further concentrate creative resources. It’s about remaining open to change while moving towards more open and collective forms of artistic flourishing rather than backing new monopolies and privileges of creative power. About finding ways to maintain individual agency while acknowledging its foundations in collective knowledge, to pursue particular interests while building networks of mutual support, to be both oneself and part of something larger.

    → 1:24 PM, Jan 27
  • Watch “A Bikeride Through a Hvidovre That Never Was” from “Hvidovre Makes Good Times Better” at Hvidovre Main Library here: makertube.net/w/qQRMRGz…

    Hvidovre Makes Good Times Better is a counterfactual project supported by: The Danish Arts Foundation, the Discretionary Fund of Hvidovre Municipality & Hvidovre Libraries Thanks to: Svend Vibe Dahlgren, Trine Friedrichsen, Majken Hansen, Dorte Bach, Henriette Laura Astrup, Rasmus Hurtig, Mathias Borello, Tania Ørum & Michael Boelt Fischer All images Have been created using the Flux.1 diffusion models from Black Forest, on a used computer powered by green electricity with certificates of origin from Nordic solar plants, wind turbines and hydroelectric facilities. None of this is, of course, a guarantee that the project doesn’t harm our environment, but it should be understood as an attempt to use as few resources as possible and minimise damage while realising the project.

    → 1:31 AM, Jan 27
  • Trump in Romania

    Looking at Trump’s America in 2025, i find that there are remarkable and surprising similarities to Romania’s financial situation in the 1990s. Both periods feature political figures becoming involved with risky financial schemes. The new Trump cryptocurrency token, i for example essentially a digital currency bearing his name, has reached a market value of 10 billion dollars in just two days, with its price rising from 10 to 74 dollars before settling at 33 dollars. A related project, World Liberty Financial, has also raised 300 million dollars.

    The parallels with Romanian pyramid schemes are notable. In the 1990s, an organization called Caritas promised 800% returns over three months. Political figures either supported these schemes or remained silent while people invested their savings. Similarly, people are now investing in the Trump token based on political trust rather than underlying value.

    The key difference is in potential impact. When Romania’s schemes collapsed, the damage was contained within national borders. Modern cryptocurrency markets are globally interconnected - a significant collapse could affect international financial systems. The same basic pattern of mixing political influence with unregulated financial products is repeating, but with more sophisticated technology and broader reach. The speed and scale of the Trump token’s growth suggests potential risks that could extend far beyond what occurred in Romania.

    → 4:02 PM, Jan 26
  • Om håbet i de sociale medier

    Jeg logger på hver morgen af samme grund, som jeg laver kunstudstillinger. Ikke fordi jeg investerer mit håb i de sociale medier eller kunstverdenens nuværende form, men fordi det er sådan, verden er indrettet lige nu. De er begge realiteter, jeg ikke har valgt, men som jeg må forholde mig til.

    De sociale platforme er blevet den primære infrastruktur for social synlighed og udveksling. De fremstiller sig selv som naturlige og uundgåelige, selvom de er skabt og opretholdt af specifikke kommercielle interesser. Det er fascinerende at tænke tilbage på BBS-scenen (Bulletin Board Systems) fra 1980’erne og 90’erne - digitale mødesteder hvor brugere via telefonmodem kunne ringe op til private computere og deltage i diskussioner, dele filer og skabe fællesskaber, der længe før internettet blev allestedsnærværende, drømte om decentraliserede netværk og fri udveksling af ideer. Vi fik med tiden de sociale netværk som en slags version af denne drøm filtreret gennem venture capital og misforstået science fiction, men desværre i en form hvor frihed er blevet til overvågning og fællesskab til data.

    Der findes mange andre måder, vi kunne organisere vores digitale socialitet på, ligesom der kunne være andre måder at værdsætte og muliggøre kunstnerisk arbejde. Nonkonforme kunstnere - fra det tidligere Østeuropa til Hong Kong i dag - har gennem tiden vist os, at selv når det virker umuligt, kan man skabe alternative rum og praksisser. Deres lokalt forankrede ofte usynlige modstand og eksperimenter peger på utopiske muligheder, der transcenderer både det globale markeds ensretning og nationalstaternes kontrol. Ved at insistere på at forestille sig andre verdener, bliver deres praksis ikke blot en kritik af samtiden, men også et vidnesbyrd om, at forandring er mulig nedefra - ikke som en totalitær vision der skal påtvinges, men som mangfoldige lokale rum der kan inspirere og forbinde sig med hinanden på tværs af grænser.

    Men det er langt fra altid tydeligt her lokalt, hvornår vi udfordrer de sociale medier, og hvornår vi bare bidrager til deres vækst. Vi drømte om digitale fællesskaber uden centrum, og nu har vi platforme, der simulerer intimitet, mens de høster vores opmærksomhed. Enhver drøm om fri kommunikation risikerer at blive til et nyt overvågningssystem med en ny konge, hvis ikke de underliggende strukturer og ideologier ændres.

    De forskellige forsøg på at skabe alternative sociale platforme lige nu er vigtige og værd at støtte op om. Men de er også ofte midlertidige og skrøbelige, afhængige af de samme infrastrukturer og økonomier, de forsøger at erstatte. Måske er deres største værdi, at de minder os om muligheden for andre måder at organisere vores digitale liv på.

    At være på dagens sociale medier giver os forbindelser til hinanden, men disse forbindelser er algoritmisk styrede, overvågede og kommercialiserede. Det står i skarp kontrast til BBS’ernes rå, ujævne socialitet, hvor hastighed og rækkevidde var begrænset, med langsomme forbindelser og lokale fællesskaber.

    For mig er BBS-scenens historie er ikke bare nostalgi - den er en konkret påmindelse om, at vores digitale infrastrukturer kunne være anderledes struktureret. At der stadig er værdi i og mulighed for mere decentraliserede, brugerstyrede platforme - erfaring som jeg håber at holde i live for at de kan blive relevant igen, når de teknologiske og samfundsmæssige forhold ændrer sig.

    At være kritisk deltagende på de sociale medier er ikke heroisk. Det er en position fuld af kompromiser og selvmodsigelser. Som kunstner navigerer man konstant mellem nødvendigheden af at være synlig på platformene og ønsket om at undslippe deres logik. Vi famler os frem mellem resignation og håb, mellem accept og modstand. Men ved at holde erindringen om alternative muligheder i live, kan vi måske bevarer vi evnen til at forestille os og skabe anderledes digitale fællesskaber, når muligheden byder sig.

    → 11:10 AM, Jan 26
  • I just discovered that my current shard viz.social does not like me posting in danish (i probably should have read the faq a bit more carefully) - luckily i am not that invested here yet so i can still migrate, and i wonder if you know of a mastodon server with a more lenient view on bilingual post that i can move to?

    → 9:43 AM, Jan 25
  • Smagfuldhed

    Når jeg bevæger mig ind i et udstillingsrum, mærker jeg hvor svært det er at forestille mig alternativer til de præsentationsformer, jeg kender så godt. De hvide vægge, den generøse afstand mellem værkerne, den præcise temperatur - alt dette sidder så dybt i min forståelse af, hvordan kunst skal opleves, at selv tanken om andre former føles umulig. Disse konventioner fremstår selvfølgelige, som var de naturlige betingelser for at se på kunst. Denne naturliggørelse af bestemte rumlige og æstetiske konventioner udgør en specifik politik - en magtform så subtil, at den næsten er usynlig for os, der er vokset op med den.

    Institutionens tekster taler aldrig om denne politik. De fokuserer udelukkende på værkernes indhold, kontekst og kunstnernes intentioner, mens de tier om alle de uskrevne regler for hvordan man gebærder sig i rummet. Ved at ignorere disse grundlæggende aspekter af udstillingsoplevelsen, gør teksterne det endnu sværere at tale om og dermed også at udfordre den institutionelle organiserings effekter.

    For dem der ikke er indviede i kunstinstitutionens koder, bliver denne tavshed særligt problematisk. Når teksterne ikke anerkender eller diskuterer de rumlige og sociale normer, fremstår disse som naturlige og selvfølgelige snarere end som bevidste institutionelle valg. Den besøgende, der føler sig fremmed i rummet, får ingen hjælp til at forstå hvorfor - teksterne taler kun om kunst, ikke om de sociale og rumlige betingelser for at opleve den.

    Den monumentale arkitektur påvirker vores bevægelser og stemmer. De høje lofter og det kontrollerede lys dikterer en bestemt adfærd: dæmpede samtaler, langsomme bevægelser, accepterende holdning til den præsenterede viden. Men ingen tekster diskuterer hvordan denne arkitektur disciplinerer vores kroppe eller hvordan den etablerer bestemte hierarkier mellem beskuer og værk. Disse effekter forbliver uudtalte og derfor også uangribelige.

    Den spredte ophængning signalerer en særlig form for økonomisk position - muligheden for at lade være med at udnytte pladsen fuldt ud. Det står i kontrast til ældre tiders tætpakkede salon-ophængning og vidner om et specifikt forhold til ressourcer. Men denne sammenhæng mellem rumlig organisation og økonomisk magt forbliver udiskuteret i institutionens selvfremstilling.

    De store sale og ceremonielle trapper gør enhver tvivl eller uenighed til noget malplaceret. Selv når værkerne inviterer til dialog, undergraver rummets karakter denne mulighed. Teksterne taler om dialog og deltagelse, men ignorerer hvordan selve den arkitektoniske ramme modarbejder dette ved at etablere en atmosfære af ærbødighed.

    Dette bliver særligt tydeligt ved udstillinger om politiske eller sociale spørgsmål. Vægteksterne kan tale om ulighed eller institutionel magt, men de nævner aldrig hvordan selve udstillingsrummet gennem sin fysiske form manifesterer præcis de magtstrukturer, værkerne forsøger at kritisere.

    Selv ideen om “god smag” - denne uudtalte men allestedsnærværende standard for præsentation - forbliver udiskuteret. Teksterne forholder sig til værkernes æstetik men aldrig til den institutionelle æstetik, der indrammer dem. De stiller aldrig spørgsmål ved hvem der definerer denne smag, eller hvordan den former vores oplevelse.

    Verden udenfor institutionen rummer andre måder at organisere og præsentere materialer på. En markedsplads skaber komplekse forbindelser mellem objekter. En byggeplads arrangerer materialer efter andre principper. Disse organiseringer følger andre logikker - praktiske, opportunistiske eller styret af andre æstetiske hensyn. De tillader objekter at mødes på måder, der fremstår kaotiske efter institutionelle standarder, men som åbner for andre betydninger og sanselige erfaringer.

    I kanten af kunstverdenen findes steder, hvor institutionel smagfuldhed møder andre former. I kunstnerdrevne rum kæmper værkerne med bygningers forfald og historie. I forladte butikker sidder den kommercielle æstetik i væggene. I private hjem eller industrielle rum må kunsten forhandle med hverdagens logik. Disse steder tillader ofte en mere direkte diskussion af deres egne betingelser og begrænsninger - her bliver rummets politik ikke gemt bag en facade af neutralitet.

    I kanten af kunstverdenen findes steder, hvor institutionel smagfuldhed møder andre former. I kunstnerdrevne rum i tidligere fabrikker eller baggårdsbygninger kæmper værkerne med bygningers forfald og historie. I midlertidige udstillinger i forladte butikker hvor den kommercielle æstetik stadig sidder i væggene. I projekter der overtager private hjem eller industrielle rum, hvor kunst må forhandle med hverdagens og arbejdets mere hverdagslige logikker. I disse eksperimenterende udstillingsrum tillader de fysiske rammer og den løsere institutionelle struktur ofte en mere direkte diskussion af deres egne betingelser og begrænsninger - her bliver rummets politik ikke gemt bag en facade af neutralitet.

    Også blandt de etablerede institutioner findes enkelte steder, der bevidst eksperimenterer med udstillingsrummets politik. Her reorganiseres samlingerne efter andre principper end kronologi og stilhistorie, værkerne møder hverdagslige genstande, og arkitekturen tillades at være synlig som andet end neutral baggrund. Disse eksperimenter giver appetit på mere - på flere institutioner der tør udfordre deres egne konventioner, på udstillinger der lader forskellige ordener og logikker mødes, på rum der inviterer til andre måder at være sammen om kunst på.

    Det er disse steder jeg orienterer mig mod, når jeg søger udstillinger der ikke bare taler om politik i deres tekster, men også tør diskutere deres egen rumlige politik. Ikke fordi de tilbyder en vej ud af institutionen, men fordi de demonstrerer at den institutionelle tavshed om egne normer og magtformer ikke er nødvendig.

    Der er noget både opmuntrende og melankolsk ved at skrive en tekst som denne. Siden 1960’erne - og sikkert længe før - har kunstnere, kritikere og kuratorer formuleret lignende analyser af kunstinstitutionens uudtalte normer. Fra den institutionskritiske kunst over alternative spaces-bevægelsen til Fluxus og situationisterne har der været utallige forsøg på at udvide eller nedbryde den institutionelle smagfuldheds dominans.

    Det faktum at denne type kritik stadig føles relevant og nødvendig, fortæller måske mere om den institutionelle smagfuldheds sejlivethed end om kritikkens utilstrækkelighed. Den “gode smag” har vist sig bemærkelsesværdig god til at absorbere og indoptage selv de mest radikale forsøg på at udfordre den. Og alligevel - eller måske netop derfor - forbliver det vigtigt at insistere på, at tingene kunne være anderledes. Ikke fordi denne insisteren nødvendigvis fører til fundamentale ændringer i kunstinstitutionen, men fordi den holder muligheden åben for andre måder at tænke og praktisere kunst på.

    → 9:17 AM, Jan 25
  • Mikrofest

    My book “I Am a Failed Artist” has been available on Mikrofest for for a while now. I genuinely value their approach to distributing independent publications - they’ve created a thoughtful platform that bridges the gap between small publishers and readers. The site, which now hosts works from 39 independent publishers, demonstrates how digital platforms can support alternative publishing practices and support grassroots publishing.

    While Mikrofest successfully addresses book distribution, I’ve been thinking about how we lack a similar platform for art editions, print and multiples. A comparable service for prints, small sculptures, artist books, and other limited editions could help artists reach collectors directly and make smaller art editions more accessible to the public. Such a platform could streamline the often complicated process of distributing art editions while maintaining the careful curation that makes Mikrofest work so well for independent publishers.

    I wonder which organizations might have both the infrastructure and resources to establish something similar for art editions? Perhaps an existing art institution, a collective of galleries, or even a group of artists with technical expertise? Perhaps such a platform already exists, but I am just unaware of it?

    mikrofest.dk/shop/a-mo…

    → 1:07 PM, Jan 24
  • Figure 20: Ølgaard's Corner (from the show Hvidovre Makes Good Times Better)

    Ølgaard’s Corner exists as a unique phenomenon within Hvidovre’s underground culture—a term for the spaces where breakdancers, graffiti artists, and union members came together in the suburb’s in-between areas. Originally conceived by the municipality’s road and park department as a practical joke, it evolved into a network of unofficial meeting places where bartering became an essential form of urban survival.

    An “Ølgaard’s Corner” could emerge anywhere. Graffiti artists traded spray cans for workers’ surplus paint, breakdancers taught craftsmen new moves in exchange for tools, and rappers composed lyrics for union campaigns in return for home-grown vegetables. These spaces functioned as cultural free zones, where working-class solidarity traditions intertwined with hip-hop’s DIY ethos.

    Today, the term has become part of Hvidovre’s oral tradition, a symbol for locations where values were created through direct person-to-person exchange. To say, “See you at Ølgaard’s Corner,” was not merely to name a meeting place but to evoke an entire philosophy of community and cultural exchange, rooted in old worker traditions and reimagined through contemporary urban expression.

    “Hvidovre Makes Good Times Better” An exhibition by Kristoffer Ørum at Hvidovre Central Library 16 January - 28 February 2025 Opening Hours: Monday: 10:00-19:00 Tuesday-Friday: 10:00-18:00 Saturday-Sunday: 10:00-16:00 Venue: Hvidovre Central Library, Hvidovrevej 280, 2650 Hvidovre, Denmark A2 prints available for 50 EUR each at oerum.tpopsite.com This counterfactual art project merges AI-generated imagery with human-written narratives to explore an alternative history of Hvidovre. Through this reimagining, the exhibition examines how the cultural intersection of local DIY hip-hop culture and labour movements might have shaped this Danish suburb differently. Supported by: Danish Arts Foundation, Hvidovre Municipality Discretionary Fund, and Hvidovre Libraries Acknowledgements: Svend Vibe Dahlgren, Trine Friedrichsen, Majken Hansen, Dorte Bach, Henriette Laura Astrup, Rasmus Hurtig, Tania Ørum, Miriam Boolsen, Michael Boelt Fischer, and all hip-hop artists and labour movement participants in Hvidovre.

    #frihedlighthedoghiphop #freedeomequalityandhiphop #thisisnothistory #HvidovreMakesGoodTimesBetter #HvidovreGøreGodeTiderBedre #speculativehistory #AIart

    → 11:38 AM, Jan 24
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