The 2011 Bergen International Festival: Let yourself be captivated!
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- The 2011 Bergen International Festival: Let Yourself Be Captivated!
- December 17, 2010
You’re invited to spend a night in the old Bergen county jail during the 2011 Festival. The building has been empty for twenty years. – The prison and the stories in its walls create a unique setting for experiencing art, says Festival Director Per Boye Hansen.
The Bergen International Festival has asked multidisciplinary artist Kurt Johannessen to be the project’s curator, and the overnight guests will be subjected to a series of experiences in the course of a 12-hour stay. A number of artists as well as the Bergen National Academy of the Arts contribute to the programme, and the audience will experience the artists and one another up close and personal.
– Spending a night in jail, voluntarily, provides an opportunity to engage fully. The Bergen International Festival is challenging the audience to step out of everyday life and experience music, installations and performance art behind these walls, says the Festival Director. He believes that Johannessen’s poetic, minimalist and often humoristic expression makes him the right man for this curator job.
The old prison in the city centre was built in 1867 and in use until 1990. The idea of using the prison for a Festival performance was developed together with Harald Victor Hove, Commissioner for cultural affairs, sports, and ownership in the municipality of Bergen. The prison building itself is protected and discussions about its use have been going on for some time. In Hove’s opinion, it is only natural to fill it with culture and the arts.
Demonstrates possibilities
– With this Bergen International Festival project, we gain further insight into the building’s possibilities. Perhaps the project will add to the debate around its future use? For us, it is great that the Bergen International Festival wants to employ new arenas like this one. The threshold for experiencing the Festival should be low, but the artistic quality high, says Hove.
The municipality has conducted fire safety analyses as well as other safety examinations, and will clean the building thoroughly before the Festival performance in spring.
Keep the atmosphere
– We want it to be safe and clean, but still keep the special atmosphere. We do not wish to wipe out the traces of what has happened here, says Boye Hansen, adding that it is challenging to create an artistic programme customized to this arena.
– Art is not supposed to “cuddle with” history. We will offer artistic experiences, and not refer to what went on in the building earlier. It speaks for itself, he says.
The prison will house 80 people, and the audience members can choose between sleeping alone or in a two-man or four-man cell. A light evening meal and breakfast will be served.
