Aarhus Concert Hall was inaugurated in 1982 as a landmark for classical music and cultural prestige, designed to channel sound and attention in fixed directions. For many years, the spaces were used accordingly, but over time, alternative practices began to take root in rehearsal rooms, foyers, and late-night hours. A 2019 renovation using recycled wood and an open-access model paved the way for more flexible uses, where users now organise activities through informal arrangements and temporary collectives. Today, the boundaries between stage and hall, audience and performer, function and form are in flux, and the building is continually reshaped by those who use it.
Aarhus’er #1
Kristoffer Ørum & Emilio Hestepis: Aarhus’er #1 Kunsthal Aarhus → 27 June – 2 November 2025
Aarhus’er #1 is a collaborative exhibition by artist Kristoffer Ørum and rapper Emilio Hestepis. Together, they reimagine the city of Aarhus through hip-hop, DIY culture and artificial intelligence, transforming Kunsthal Aarhus into a fictional version of the city shaped by alternative rhythms, graffiti and speculative memory.
The exhibition presents a 15-metre legal graffiti wall, a giant record player, lo-fi mixtapes, deepfakes, DIY furniture, and historical snapshots from a city that could have been. At its centre is hip-hop—not as a fixed genre, but as a set of evolving loca l practices. DJing, MCing, breakdance and graffiti appear in distorted, Aarhus-specific forms that blur fact and fiction, protest and play.
The show is the most expansive chapter to date in Ørum’s ongoing counterfactual project Frihed, lighed og hip-hop. But here, that work becomes something new—a shared platform developed in close collaboration with Hestepis, who also contributes an original soundtrack.
Supported by the Obel Family Fund, New Carlsberg Foundation, Danish Arts Foundation, Augustinus Foundation, C.A.C Fonden, Knud Højgaards Foundation, Lemvigh-Müller Fonden, and Spar Nord Foundation.
More info: kunsthalaarhus.dk/da/udstillinger/kristoffer-oerum-emilio-hestepis-aarhuser-1
With thanks to Katrine Malinovsky, Mathias Borello, Hannah Mathiesen Keegan, Michael Bolt Fisher, Salling, Batch Productions, Brian Sørensen, Tania Ørum, and many more.
