As part of the 2026 program, O—Overgaden is proud to present the major group exhibition IN PROTEST AND IN CARE, curated by Anne Kølbæk Iversen, opening in late summer 2026.
Participating artists: Kirstine Aarkrog (DK, 1986), Rikke Benborg (DK, 1973), Jesse Darling (UK, 1981), Julie Falk (DK, 1994), Kasper Hesselbjerg (DK, 1985), Marie Kølbæk Iversen (DK, 1981), Jakob Jakobsen (DK, 1965), Derek Jarman/Christopher Robert Jones, Frida Jersø (DK, 1997), Carolyn Lazard (US, 1987), Christine Sun Kim & Thomas Mader (US, 1980 / GE, 1984), Elisabeth Molin (DK, 1985), Bernd Oppl (AT, 1980), Alex Dolores Salerno (US, 1994), Victor Vejle (DK, 1994), Anna Walther (DK, 1990), and Bobbi-Johanne Østervang (DK, 1990).
IN PROTEST AND IN CARE takes place in O—Overgaden’s ground floor galleries as well as, among other locations, Arne Jacobsen’s Pavilions at Enghave Plads. The group exhibition features works by several Danish and international artists who engage with bodily complexity, temporary and permanent impairment, and the physical as well as linguistic barriers that disable. By challenging existing ideas of vulnerability and care, and proposing new perspectives on what constitutes artistic productivity and value, the works raise questions such as: What alternative identities and communities emerge through variations from the normative body and mind? How can one bend the body to meet expectations and demands—or, conversely, bend time and the external world to meet a body with functional variations? What potentials and possible forms of protest lie in withdrawal? Where is the line between the treatment-ready patient and the impatient subject who rebels against diagnostic methods and the objectification embedded in medical language? Several of the works present material investigations of bodily and mental collapse—how they can be both conditions and resources in artistic practice. At the same time, they turn a critical gaze toward the institution itself and the expectations we place on art and the artist.
The exhibition is part of Anne Kølbæk Iversen’s three-year postdoctoral project Crip Time: Art of Impairment, Withdrawal, and Impatience (2024–27), hosted by O—Overgaden and the University of Copenhagen with support from the New Carlsberg Foundation. The project aligns with O—Overgaden’s overarching focus in recent years on the mechanisms of inclusion and exclusion in the cultural field, including the institution’s own barriers and driving forces. Since the path to physical access to O—Overgaden’s listed building extends beyond the scope of the exhibition itself, parts of the exhibition will be located outside of O—Overgaden’s premises, and an ambitious public program will be developed to make the exhibition accessible to audience groups beyond those with direct access to the building. The exhibition will also be accompanied by a publication and a symposium.
Work from bed, Anna Walther, 2025.
Antiform, Julie Falk. Photo by David Stjernholm
Christine Sun Kim and Thomas Mader, Tables and Windows, 2016. Photo: Paul Salveson. Courtesy of the Artist and François Ghebaly, Los Angeles, New York.
Triangle, Jesse Darling, 2019.
Work from bed, Anna Walther, 2025.