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16-18/05/2024, GATHERING
Svartlöga is a sailing ship that functions as both an exhibition and community platform across the art world and the maritime community. It is run by a voluntary association invested in the renovation of the boat through the running of an experimental platform for contemporary art called OXER.
The Svartlöga ship is both run as a community working to restore the ship, as well as an experimental platform for art and culture called OXER. OXER focuses on rethinking, challenging and contextualizing the use of a ship.
Hosting Lands is a decentralized exhibition movement around land rights, accessibility, belonging, and host-guest relationships, and politics. As one key exhibition aspect, Hosting Lands, looks at different methods for surviving collectively among what is left within the ruins of colonial capitalism.
The gathering is the first, and inaugural, bigger public exhibitionary moment of Hosting Lands. It marks the new chapter of Svartlöga as cultural platform in Grenaa harbor where it got its new home in January (this year). It is a begging, an arrival, a seed.
The co-hosting between OXER and Hosting Lands from this ship means hosting from a bridge: between communities and disciplines, boating to exhibition making, a local harbor and an artist community. The encounter will center questions about arrival, borders, bridges and politics of encounters. Here, we wonder: What does it mean to arrive in a place already inhabited? Host from a place where we are also ourselves guests? How can different communities forming a scattered and heterogeneous coalition of voices, bodies, practices meet, expand and support each other? What are the relations of the hosts and guests on this ship and around the sea?
Svartlöga carries heavy histories. During the Cold War, it was a Swedish minesweeper. Later it became a cultural platform. In 2018, as it sank to the bottom of the sea, the current community organized to salvage and rescue the ship. Now they are restoring it from the damages. The ship hovers with questions of war, violence and trauma. As it moves through waters, a ship, as a figure, both connects and alienates people and places. It opens up histories of slavery, migration and border politics across times. We then ask: how and with whom can we gather in such a ruin?
The gathering practices storytelling and renegotiations of mythologies and traditions as ways to possibly gather, bridge, share, challenge, connect and hold responsibilities - between guests from abroad, local guests as well as local and new coming hosts, all bringing their knowledge, relations and stories to the ship.
Thursday 16th May
15:30—16:30 Welcome
The bar is open and the hosts will welcome everyone.Location: Svartlöga Accessibility: The ship is not accessible with a wheelchair, but the speeches can be listened to from the harbor. Language: Danish & English
16:30—17:00 Shanties concert by Slupkoret: The Leaving of Kattegat Sea (or The Mermen’s Lament)
Artist Harun Morrison has visited the choir in Ebeltoft over a few times, and he is currently in the
process of rewriting the lyrics to a selection of the songs.
Whereas many sea songs focus on fleeting human relationships and nostalgia for a homeland,
these lyrics will reimagine the sea song as a way of thinking of humans from the perspectives of
the sea and sea life. The lyrics reference pollution, Merpeople, Jutland folklore, industrial fishing and
changing weather systems. He will present his thoughts behind it in the conversation with artist
Marie Kølbæk Iversen the following day.Location: Svartlöga Accessibility: The ship is not accessible with a wheelchair, but the speeches can be listened to from the harbor. Language: Danish & English
17:00—17:30 Artist presentations of exhibited artworks at Svartlöga
Location: Svartlöga Accessibility: Not wheelchair accessible. Language: English
17:30—18:00 Kids breakdance with Barly Tshibanda
Kids of all ages are invited to join the breakdance workshop with dancer and artist Barly Tshibanda.
Location: The harbor, next to SvartlögaAccessibility: Wheelchair accessible. Language: Primarily English, but Danish explanations possible
18:30—19:30 Communal Dinner
A vegetarian meal cooked and served by Food Koreografi
Location: Marine house Accessibility: Wheelchair accessible. Language: Own preferences
Price: 50 DKK for one meal + one drink. Limited capacity - sign up via link
20:00— Bar and open story telling session: Stories from/around the sea
The evening will end with an open storytelling session. The hosts have invited local people from
Grenaa to share stories about their life on and around the sea. The audiences are welcome to share
their sea stories too!
Location: Svartlöga, and at the harbor next to itAccessibility: The ship is not accessible with a wheelchairLanguage: Danish & English, or other languages, according to own preferences
Friday 17th May
13:00—15:00 Monia Sander Haj-Mohamed:
Collective writing workshop
At a coin from the bottom of the sea, we will meet for two hours to engage in collective writing
processes. Introducing the “spect-actor”, from Augusto Boal’s Theatre of the Oppressed to open
source coding practices, we will build upon the voices of each other by rewriting each other’s small
scripts about the sea, movement, money, breath and loss into an ever branching and evolving
story. Pushing our collective imagination, we will shape new compasses that can help us navigate
the socio-economic conditions we are in.
A similar workshop will take place in Tunisia and the texts will be uploaded to an online site to
be used freely by everyone. They will also be used later in the open source theatre production,
Crying by the Sea. For those who have smartphones, bring them fully charged. There will be a few
chargers and laptops available for those without phones.
Location: SvartlögaAccessibility: The ship is not accessible with a wheelchairLanguage: English (translation into Danish possible)
15:00—17:00 Fremtidsarkæologi med Molboøsters og venner by Bureau for Mellemartslig Kommunikation
Kids ceremony
You are invited to a collective ceremony for the ocean quahog, a species that can live for up to at
least 500 years. This makes the quahog the oldest critter on the planet known to humans.
Inspired by Ursula K. Le Guin’s Always Coming Home, we will perform a collective future archaeology
ritual with 200 ocean quahog glass sculptures, and clay from the Rugaard beach. The participants
will pick one quahog sculpture and then sculpt a gift to the critter in clay. During the session, we
will share fantasies and imagninations of the future. When we have all made our sculptures, we will
sacrifice it by dropping it into the sea and making a wish for the future.
Location: Svartlöga, and at the harbor next to the shipAccessibility: The ship is not accessible with a wheelchairLanguage: Primarily in Danish
Age: 3 years and up
17:00—18:00 Harun Morrison & Marie Kølbæk Iversen: Sea Songs
Artist conversation
In their different artistic practices Morrison and Kølbæk Iversen explore human relationships to both
land and aquatic environments across past and present storytellings. The two artists will converse
about their processes of investigating and renegotiating old folk tales and songs connected to the
sea.
Location: SvartlögaAccessibility: The ship is not accessible with a wheelchairLanguage: English
18:30—19:30 Communal Dinner
Vegetarian dinner cooked and served by Food Koreografi
A vegetarian meal cooked and served by Food Koreografi
Location: Marine house Accessibility: Wheelchair accessible. Language: Own preferences
Price: 50 DKK for one meal + one drink. Limited capacity - sign up via link
19:00—20:30 Screening of Ponyo (Gake no ue no Ponyo)
Film screening
Go to the cozy frontship of Svartlöga and watch the adventurous movie Ponyo by Hayao Miyazaki.
Borrowing from the fairytaleThe little mermaid by Hans Christian Andersen, Ponyo is a literal fish-
out-of-water tale about a young girl of the sea, Ponyo, who chooses life on land after bonding with
a human boy, Sosuke. The film will be screened in Danish (with English subtitles) and is suited for
children of all ages.
Location: Marine houseAccessibility: Wheelchair accessibleLanguage: Danish with English subtitles
Age: For all ages
19:30—20:15 Ayesha Hameed: Black Atlantis: Retrograde Futurism
Lecture performance
On April 29, 2006, a twenty-foot boat was spotted off the south-eastern coast of Barbados. On
board, eleven bodies were found by the coastguards, preserved and desiccated by the sun and
salt water. The ghost ship was adrift for four months on the Atlantic Ocean. It set sail on Christmas
day in Praia in the Cape Verde Islands, full of migrants from Senegal, Guinea Bissau, and Gambia,
en route to the Canary Islands. Four months later the boat was found on the coast of Barbados.
The lecture performance, hovering between the film and the essay form, is a questioning of the
adequacy of the measuring of histories and affects connected to crossing, languages to make
evident the materiality of the sea, and the both measurable and immeasurable horror contained in
the figure of the ghost ship.
Location: Marine house Accessibility: Wheelchair accessible. Language: English
20:30— BAR HANGOUT
Location: Svartlöga, and the harbor next to the ship Accessibility: Wheelchair accessible. Language: English
Saturday 18th May
10:30—12:00 Collective maintenance (light) on the Ship
Workshop with Foreningen Svartlögas Fremtid
Take part in and learn about the maintenance work on Svartlöga, which is a continuous part of the
community work on the ship by the association: Foreningen Svartlögas Fremtid.
Location: Svartlöga Accessibility: The ship is not accessible with a wheelchair. Language: English & Danish
13:00—15:00 Harun Morrison: Environmental Justice Questions
Workshop
What is the smallest unit of life that you are connected to? What will we never give up although
we know it is bad for the planet and unfair to its inhabitants? How do we share intergenerational
knowledge? & create spaces to learn from, with and challenge our elders?
Participants are invited to collectively discuss environmental and social
justice related questions and speculate about future ways of living
together. Artist Harun Morrison has invited a range of people including
activists, writers, artworkers, theorists, architects, chefs, natural historians
and horticulturalists to propose questions relating to environmental justice
that can stimulate conversation.
Location: Marine house Accessibility: Wheelchair accessibleLanguage: English
Limited capacity - sign up via link
15:00—15:45 Yin Aiwen: Alchemy of Commons
Lecture performance
At this lecture, designer, researcher and artist, Yin Aiwen will talk about her collaborative research
project, Alchemy of Commons. Unraveling the intricate dynamics between socially-engaged art
and the European Funding Model, the lecture will illuminate the structural challenges in the art
economy that prevent contemporary art from fulfilling its societal promises. Furthermore, Aiwen will
elucidate the project’s initial findings, focusing on the nature of community and its significance in
reimagining the art economy.
Location: Marine house Accessibility: Wheelchair accessibleLanguage: English
16:00—16:30 Nanna Elvin Hansen & Barly Tshibanda: The Bridge Radio & Staying with the Struggle
Talk
The artists will present two collective projects: The community radio The Bridge Radio and the self-
published book Staying with the Struggle - looking for Decolonial Strategies for Working Together
Across Privileges. Both engage with migration politics, freedom of movements, migrant struggles,
deportation and borders.
Location: The harbor, next to Svartlöga Accessibility: The ship is not accessible with a wheelchairLanguage:English
16:30—18:00 Nanna Elvin Hansen & Barly Tshibanda: memories with water
Workshop
Elvin Hansen & Tshibanda invite audiences to take part in a sound-workshop focusing on memories
of the water. In groups, participants will engage in sound recordings and interview exercises with focus
on sensory memories of water.
Location: The harbor, next to SvartlögaAccessibility: Wheelchair accessibleLanguage: English
18:30—19:30 Communal Dinner
Vegetarian dinner is cooked and served by Food Koreografi
Location: Marine house Accessibility: Wheelchair accessible. Language: Own preferences
Price: 50 DKK for one meal + one drink. Limited capacity - sign up via link
19:30—20:30 Ayesha Hameed: In the Shadow of Our Ghosts & Ilemūria
Film screenings, followed by Q&A moderated by Pujita Guha
The film In the Shadow of Our Ghosts explores the story of migrant’s walk alone in the desert
spaces, Sahelian surroundings and urban spaces. Ilemūria is a Tamil-isation of Lemuria, a Mesozoic
land corridor imagined by 19th century paleoscientists to have subsequently sank under the sea,
in order to explain geological similarities between Madagascar and India.
The film Ilemūria explores survival as a kind of subaquatic disassociation with and through other
species and adjacent worlds.
Location: Marine houseAccessibility: Wheelchair accessibleLanguage: English
20:30—21:30 BAR HANGOUT
Location: Harbor next to SvartlögaAccessibility: Wheelchair accessible
21:32— Marie Kølbæk Iversen: Donnimaar. O Tilli
Live performance
At this sunset performance, Kølbæk Iversen, under the name of Donnimaar, performs traditional songs from
the West Jutlandic heathlands recorded in the 1870s by folklorist Evald Tang Kristensen, among others from
Kølbæk Iversen’s great-great-great-great-grandmother Johanne Tygesdatter.
The mermaids and -men of the songs sing of marginalization and exploitation. They sing of fighting for
autonomy by jumping overboard, confronting and attempting to kill the Danish King, cursing the queen, and
poking out the eyes of the priest. The songs attest to the lesser known story of the West Jutlandic resistance
against the national homogenization and territorial consolidation of Denmark during the late 1800s, when
the country went from being a seadom centered around Kattegat and the Baltic Sea to being a territorially
demarcated nation usurping the hitherto largely autonomous sandy heathlands west of the Jutland Ridge.
Location: SvartlögaAccessibility: The ship is not accessible with a wheelchairLanguage: Danish
Bikubenfonden Vision Exhibition Award | Grenaa Marineforening | Grenaa Havn A/S | Norddjurs kommune | Hotel Marina Grenaa | Ebeltoft Gårdbryggeri | Badehotellet Grenaa Strand | The Danish Arts Foundation
