New Danish Triennial ARoS to Kick Off in 2017

The exhibition will explore man's difficult relationship with nature.

ARoS Museum. Photo courtesy ARoS

Denmark will be getting a new triennial in 2017. Billed as a new international contemporary art exhibition, the triennial will be run by the ARoS Museum, in the arty city of Aarhus.

Taking place for the first time next summer, the triennial will coincide with Aarhus’ turn as European City of Culture and run throughout June and July. Titled “The Garden—End of Times; Beginning of Times” the exhibition will explore the way in which mankind has both depicted and altered nature to bring it in line with its view of the world.

“We’re delighted to be launching the first ARoS Triennial,” director of ARoS Aarhus Art Museum and founding director of the ARoS Triennial, Erlend G. Høyersten, told artnet News in a statement.

“This will be the largest exhibition staged by the museum and within the city of Aarhus to date, and will contribute significantly to Aarhus’s already vibrant cultural life,” Høyersten added. ”’The Garden—End of Times; Beginning of Times,’ will explore the relationship between man and nature with works by a variety of internationally recognized artists.”

Covering the last 400 years, the triennial will be split into three sections, simply titled: The Past, The Present, and The Future. Exploring the Landscape tradition, The Past will look at nature through the “lens of art and the history of ideas,” highlighting the changing relationship between nature and humans, and will take place at the ARoS Museum over two of their largest exhibition spaces. Works in this section will span painting from 1600s to land art from the 1960s. 

The Present, will take place throughout the city and center on investigations concerning nature’s role in contemporary society with a focus on the movement of goods and people. Meanwhile, The Future will take place along four kilometers of coastline, in a series of outdoor installations exploring the beginning of an “anthropogenic age.”

ARoS joins Copenhagen’s U-TURN Quadrennial making it the second Danish national exhibition of this kind.


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