Intimacy & Publicness is a three-day public performative arts program that unfolds in and around Blågårds Plads, Nørrebro. The program explores how intimate affects, typically reserved for private relationships, might be shared and collectively experienced in public through the medium of performance art.
Artists: Nikhil Vettukattil, Filip Vest, Marina Dubia, Jules Fischer, Lina Hashim, Klara Lopez
Inspired by cultural theorist Lauren Berlant’s concept of intimate publics, the program investigates how performance can cultivate trust, emotional resonance, and social connection among strangers in shared urban space. What happens when intimacy becomes a collective, public experience?
Through site-specific and public performances, artists will activate Blågårds Plads and its surroundings, a square originally designed as a communal gathering place and framed by Kai Nielsen’s century-old granite sculptures of the working class. The performances engage with the site’s layered histories while exploring how contemporary urban environments can accommodate intimate encounters between different identities, communities, and narratives.
At a time when diversity and the notion of safe spaces are once again under threat, Intimacy & Publicness seeks to carve out space for queer and marginalized expressions of intimacy in the public realm. The program reimagines what it means to be together in difference, asking how art can generate new forms of belonging – temporary, affective, and collective – amid the chaos and vulnerability of urban life.
The program is curated by Joachim Aagaard Friis in collaboration with SixtyEight Art Institute, PASS – Center for Practice-based Art Studies at the University of Copenhagen, and Støberiet – Copenhagen Municipality.
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PROGRAM
Friday 20 June – Støberiet
7:00–8:00 pm: Cantina: Intimations – Nikhil Vettukattil
(Limited seating – ticket link:
https://billetto.dk/e/cantina-intimations-billetter-1312548)
Saturday 21 June – Blågårds Plads
3:00–3:30 pm: The Ruins – Filip Vest
4:00–4:45 pm: Implication Studies II – Marina Dubia
5:30–6:00 pm: It Doesn’t Look Like Anything to Me – Jules Fischer
6:30–7:30 pm: Artist talk and reflection with participating artists and invited guests. Moderator: Rebekka Anker-Møller, curator at SixtyEight Art Institute
Sunday 22 June – Koncertkirken
3:00–3:30 pm: The Caryatid – Lina Hashim
4:30–5:30 pm: Artist talk and reflection with participating artists and invited guests. Moderator: Mikkel Bogh, Director of PASS – Centre for Practice-based Art Studies, University of Copenhagen
6:00–6:30 pm: Rupture – Klara Lopez
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Intimacy & Publicness
Artists: Nikhil Vettukattil, Filip Vest, Marina Dubia, Jules Fischer, Lina Hashim, Klara Lopez
Curator: Joachim Aagaard Friis
Producer: Katinka Saarnak
Sound Technician: Jamie Kee
Graphic Design: Filip Grønning
Communication: Rebekka Anker-Møller
Sponsored by: Brooklyn Brewery
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Thanks for generous support:
Augustinus Fonden, Statens Kunstfond, Dansk Tennis Fond, Office for Contemporary Art Norway, Rådet for Visuel Kunst, Louis-Hansen Fonden, Ny Carlsberg Fondet
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