About FLOAT
FLOAT is a site-specific art project based on the lake Mjøsa and its associated waterways, from a scientific and artistic perspective.
An important event in the FLOAT project is the conference taking place in Lillehammer Monday 16th and Tuesday 17th of June 2025. The conference aims to bring together artistic and research-based practices and theories under one roof and communicate this to an art-interested, but also environmentally committed audience, through presentations that shed light on site specific artistic interventions in nature, museum collections management, ecological and historical questions. The conference is organized in collaboration with the Association of Visual Artists Innlandet.
FLOAT is initiated by artist and curator Egil Martin Kurdøl, and organized in collaboration with Oplandia Center for Contemporary Art and Kunstbanken Center for Contemporary Art.
The FLOAT conference
16.-17.06.2025
Artists:
Abbas Akhavan
Ansgar Ole Olsen
Marianne Stranger
Jon Benjamin Tallerås
Judy Watson
Confirmed speakers:
Kristin Bergaust, Oslofjord Ecologies
Ingvild Krogvig, The National Museum
Eivind Slettemeås, Harpefoss kunstarena
Tilsig, Gjøvik and Toten Art Associations
Jørn Wroldsen, Mission Mjøsa, Norwegian University of Science and Technology
William Fox, Nevada Museum of Art, The Center for Art + Environment
(Full program to be released)
Compère:
Merete Hovednak, Director, Contemporary Art Centres in Norway
The conference will be held in English.
Conference program
When: June 16th-17th 2025
Where: Kulturhuset Banken, Lillehammer, Norway
Monday June 16th
11:00 – 12:00
Registration and lunch
12:00 – 12:15
Welcome, Christel Sverre, Siri Leira and curator Egil Martin Kurdøl
12:15 – 13:00
Presentation of the research project Mission Mjøsa, NTNU Gjøvik, Professor Jørn Wroldsen
13:00 – 13:20
Break
13:20 – 13:40
Artist introduction: Judy Watson
13:40 – 14:00
Artist introduction: Ansgar Ole Olsen
14:00 – 14:20
Artist introduction: Abbas Akhavan
14:20 – 14:40
Artist introduction: Jon Benjamin Tallerås
14:40 – 15:00
Break
15:00 – 15:20
Artist introduction: Marianne Stranger
15:20 – 15:50
Presentation of the research project Oslofjord Ecologies and the Oslofjord triennial, Artist and Professor Kristin Bergaust
16:00 – 17:00
Visit to Lillehammer Art Museum, presentation of Jana Winderen’s sound installation ferð
17:00 – 18:30
Break
18:30
Dinner
Tuesday June 17th
08:45 – 09:15
Registration and coffee
09:15 – 09:45
Presentation of the art project Tilsig, Gjøvik and Toten art associations
09:45 – 10:30
Presentation of previous site specific art projects in the Innlandet region, Eivind Slettemeås
10:30 – 10:50
Break
10:50 – 11:35
Presentation, Nevada Museum of Art, The Center for Art + Environment, Director William Fox
11:35 – 12:20
Presentation, The Norwegian National Museum, Curator Ingvild Krogvig
12:20 – 13:15
Lunch
13:15 – 13:45
Presentation (TBC)
13:45 – 14:00
Summary (TBC)
The FLOAT artists
Abbas Akhavan
Abbas Akhavan
Info coming
Ansgar Ole Olsen
Ansgar Ole Olsen
Info coming
Marianne Stranger
Marianne Stranger
Info coming
Jon Benjamin Tallerås
Jon Benjamin Tallerås' (b.1984, Oslo, Norway) improvised actions, informal sculpture and low-profile infiltrations belong to a tradition of urban wandering that reaches back at least as far as André Breton's photographic expeditions in 1920s Paris. Tallerås investigates urban space, exploring hidden and often non-used areas of the city. Using found materials to create sculptures and making transient performances that claim the accidental gaps and spaces formed on the margins of functional architecture.
Tallerås has exhibited extensively throughout Norway and abroad, and his works have been shown in institutions such as: The Munch Museum (Oslo), Museum of contemporary art (Oslo), Bergen Kunsthall (Bergen), Kunstnernes Hus (Oslo), Kunsthall Oslo, LIAF Biennial (Svolvær), Stavanger Kunsthall, Kristiansand Kunsthall, Treignac Projet (France), CAC Vilnius (Lithuania), Kunsthall C, Stockholm (Sweden) LCCA (Latvia) and Pori Art museum (Finland).
Judy Watson
Judy Watson
Photo: Rhett Hammerton. Image courtesy of the artist and Milani Gallery, Meeanjin/Brisbane.
Born in Mundubbera, Queensland in 1959, Judy Watson is a Waanyi descendant of north-west Queensland. Her ancestry and personal experiences have greatly influenced her artistic practice, which spans a variety of media including painting, printmaking, video, sculpture and installation.
She often addresses the complex history of colonialism and its impact on Indigenous communities. She explores themes of migration, survival and recovery, seeking to bring awareness and understanding to these issues. Her work is a powerful means of storytelling and a form of cultural preservation.
Exhibiting extensively since the 1980s, Watson co-represented Australia at the 1997 Venice Biennale and won the Works on Paper Award at the 23rd National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Award in 2006. She was also the recipient of the National Gallery of Victoria’s 2006 Clemenger Contemporary Art Award. In 2011, Watson’s exhibition waterline was shown at the Embassy of Australia in Washington DC, and in 2012, she exhibited in the Sydney Biennale. In 2018, the Art Gallery of New South Wales staged a major exhibition of her work titled the edge of memory. Watson has also received commissions for several public art projects across Australia, including fire and water at Reconciliation Place in Canberra in 2007, ngarunga nangama: calm water dream at 200 George St in Sydney and tow row for the Gallery of Modern Art’s 10th Anniversary in Brisbane in 2016, and bara at Dubbagullee (Bennelong Point) in the Sydney Royal Botanic Garden in 2022.
mudunama kundana wandaraba jarribirri, a significant survey of Judy Watson’s practice, opened in 2024 at Queensland Art Gallery | Gallery of Modern Art. Her work is also included in several significant Australian and international collections, including all of Australia’s state institutions, the National Gallery of Australia, the Tokyo National University of Technology, the Taipei Fine Arts Museum, the British Museum, and MCA/TATE. Watson is an Adjunct Professor at Griffith University, and in 2018, she was awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Art History by the University of Queensland.
Tickets
Accessibility
– Accessibility for wheelchairs/rollers/strollers:
Please use the ramp by the entrance in the backyard
– Elevator with access to all floors
– Hearing loop system
– We offer free admission with companion certificate:
Please send an email to siri.leira@oplandia.no to claim ticket
– For any questions related to accessibility/assistance, see contact info below
Contact
FLOAT is initiated by artist and curator Egil Martin Kurdøl, and organized in collaboration with Oplandia Center for Contemporary Art and Kunstbanken Center for Contemporary Art.
If you have any questions, please get in touch!
Egil Martin Kurdøl, Curator
Siri Leira, Producer, Oplandia Center for Contemporary Art
Christel Sverre, Producer, Kunstbanken Center for Contemporary Art
Supporters and collaborators
