ROSKILDE FESTIVAL’S GRAND ART AND ACTIVISM GUIDE

Written by Vera Rosenbeck, volunteer at Roskilde Festivals Mediehus

Maybe you don’t know, maybe you already knew; aside from the musical program, Roskilde Festival also has an extensive art and activism program that contains everything from talks given by young climate activist from around the world to a giant inflatable placenta to an organized trip gathering flowers and herbs for drinks making.

In this guide we have tried to make it easy for you to figure out which activity or art work that suits your mood best, to make sure that you get to see and experience as many of the exciting, fun and enlightening acts on the program as possible.

Just click a headline that matches your mood right now and then you will be presented with a list of art and activist activities that match.

When you are hung over but want to look at some art

• Pussy Ass Peace is the name of the enormous mural the artist Carolina Falkholt has created on the façade of Gloria. The name is pretty self-explanatory but swing by and see it with your own eyes. Read more
• A several meters tall placenta that almost looks alive. That is what Marie Munk has created especially for Roskilde Festival this year. Read more
• Look out at the future with other festival guests through Mike Ballard’s giant constellation that looks like a pair of oversized glasses. Read more
• Do you remember those badges you had as a kid that looked like one image from one angle but a different image from another? Artist Jens Settergren has utilized that technique to show a fetus that transforms as you walk by it. It morphs between an image of the child as a digital grid and an image of the child rendered in flesh and blood. Read more
• The artist Asbestos has painted a mural you can find at the front of the Food Court façade. In the mural he’s contemplating how tough we can be on ourselves when in reality we should be better at embracing our own vulnerability. Read more

When you have a burger in your hand and need somewhere nice to sit

• Woven Together is a colorful, woven landscape you can sit on and hang out in. Read more
• Many things have changed since the Festival was held last in 2019, but one thing remains: Claudia Comté’s large wooden installation consisting of 16 tree trunks that spell the words ME and WE. Go by Dream City, eat your burger at the base of the letters or enjoy the spectacular view of the camping site with a new friend next to you. Read more
• This year you can experience a 2000 square meters big artwork in the shape of a giant dancefloor, created specifically to the hilly landscape. Board the artwork, dance yourself happy and enjoy the colorful installation. Read more

When you’re bored with beer bowling but want to do something fun with your camp

• Grab your best knitting buddy and come hear Lærke Bagger tell the story of her knitting journey and her knitting rebellion. Afterwards you can participate in a knitting workshop (bring your own needles), where the imperfect is celebrated and all mistakes forgiven. Read more
• Mellemfolkeligt Samvirke is ready to help you give your old t-shirts new life with a cool or powerful message in their textile printing workshop. You can also print on tote bags or make a flag for your camp. Read more
• Do you want to be a part of writing a new protest song? Then come join Arbejdermuseet’s workshop, where you can learn about the history of the protest song and have the opportunity to contribute to a brand-new protest song that the collective RAPOLITICS will perform later on the festival. Read more
• Learn how to use tools and build in wood with Log Ladies when they host a building workshop with focus on gender and minorities. Read more
• Experience a workshop and a quiz with the sex toy producer Peech. Learn about the wide selection of sex toys on the market, and if you participate in their quiz you can wind nice and spicy prices. Read more

When you want to try something that only makes sense on Roskilde Festival

• If you are up for trying something completely new, this is for you. Bring your camp buddies to the Great School of Insects, where you get the opportunity to thank the planet’s buzzing friends for all of their hard work. Amongst other things you will get to do a friendship ritual wearing insect masks, doing insect buzzing and a bee dance. Read more
• Take a break from the camping site to go and collect herbs and flowers with Wild Drinks. Learn about the local edible plants and hunt for pretty and tasty flowers to make syrup for drinks. Read more
• Our democracy is dependent on our participation. At C:NTACT’s workshop you get to take an active role in creating democracy, when you and the rets of the audience have to solve a conflict being played out by three actors. Read more
• Have you ever wondered how it feels to be inside a womb? Well wonder no more. In Anna Aagaard’s installation WombRoom, you will travel through a womb, meeting other festival guests as wandering eggs. Read more
• Fiction and music will meet when the band First Hate interprets Cecilie Lind’s novel Pigedyr. Lean back and experience a unique musical mashup of alternative pop and electronic dream worlds. Read more
• Learn to dance modern dance on Katharina Grosse’s gigantic dance floor of an artwork. There will be three different dancing workshops with focus on using the body and everybody can join regardless of dance level! Read more

When you want a musical experience that is more than a concert

• If you want dance, theater, song, comedy and improvisation with an avantgarde showgirl twist, performed by artful, funny and visually impressive crossdressers in colorful costumes, then you should go and see MIKEY. Woodbridge and Lucio Vidal on Ambereum! Read more
• Join a spectacular dragshow combined with a live pop performance when Katana Six and cowboy blau, who is one and the same, goes all out on Ambereum. Read more
• Experience Louella May’s dance performance which mixes elegant, modern dance moves with stumbles and mistakes to examine how we use our body to store experience. Read more
• Listen to kids from public housing areas perform with music and inspiring stories about their artistic journey with Turning Tables. Read more

When you are passing Gloria

• In Gloria’s foyer you can see a chandelier with green hair, created by artist Sahar Jamili. The chandelier symbolizes the division that occurs when you come from two different cultures and the clashes it can result in. Read more
• In the same foyer you can find a human size sculptor of an ancient moon goddess that the artist Nanna Lysholt Hansen has created to watch over all of us at the festival. Read more
• You can also watch the film Peaceful Warrior, where artist Tabita Rezaire is training her uterus force to heal racialized people from colonial trauma. Read more

When you want your mind blown

• Roskilde Festival’s newest scene is called Platform and is an artwork in itself. Platform is a dynamic room, changing from a closed, darkened space to a wide-open space simply by moving the walls. Read more hereand here
• This is going to be wild. Lawrence Lee, musician and physicist at CERN has built Colliderscope, which uses sound waves to visualize particle physics. Come and have your mind blown in a synthesis of music and physics at FLOKKR. Read more
• Watch from the sideline when a group of female dancers dressed as horses will ride through the camping site in an act to create room for women and their place in history in a male dominated world. Read more
• Producer and musician Noah Rosanes will lock himself in a mobile studio 24 hours a day during the entire festival to create musical art with different guests. You can experience the creation process from outside of the studio. Read more

When you want to learn something you did not know you wanted to learn

• This year Roskilde Festival is also a testing facility where young entrepreneurs will try out and develop innovative green solutions. Come and hear them explain their ideas in Science Pavilion. Read more
• In this workshop all of the festival’s guests are invited to collect dirt from the camp site and display a microcosmos. You will get to cultivate the dirt samples in petri dishes and observe as microcosmos is developing in front of your eyes, all overseen by Studio Thinking Hand. Read more
• Hear conservation technologist Topher White explain how his company is using old cell phones to detect illegal logging and poaching in some of the most vulnerable natural areas in the world. Read more
• Operation Dagsværk is inviting you to make plant-dyed banners in the same way the indigenous peoples do it in Thailand. At the same time, you can hear about how their living conditions are threatened – and how the climate movement is really their movement. Read more
• Normally particle physics and festival are not two concepts you would think of in the same sentence, but that fact will be changed in Science Pavilion, where CERN - the European Organization for Nuclear Research – is inviting you to come play with elementary particles, cosmic rays, sun cells, alcohol and much more. Read more

When you want to learn more about the important themes of the festival

• Meet musicians and debaters who will talk about representation in the Danish music industry, arranged by the organization Another Life, who is behind an award-winning report in the matter. Read more
• Learn about sex, porn and consent when the porn producers Bedside Productions give a talk about how they create safe spaces in their productions and at their sex positive parties. Read more
• Together, Roskilde Festival, The Green Youth Movement, Fridays for Future, LGBT+ Denmark and YoungEnergy have developed a great program, centered around their different activist agendas. For example, you can come and learn about activist perspectives on the climate crisis, you can participate in a collective dream about a greener future, discuss safe spaces or do body paint with nature themes. Read more here, here, here and here
• It is difficult to imagine how it must feel to flee your home country and everything you know, when you are sitting in your camping chair drinking the first cold beer of the day. None the less that is the reality for some people right now. If you want to know more about how that experience shapes you, and how we all can help to make it a little easier to carry, then swing by this talk arranged by DFUNK featuring a group of kick ass youths with refugee background. Read more
• We never get tired of talking about sex. In FLOKKR you can have all your questions about festival sex, boundaries, consent and much more answered, when Emma Liebner and a sex panel presents a live “problem page” on stage. Read more
• If you want to learn more about the climate crisis, recycling, green building materials and much more, then come by the Climate Pavilion, which EAHR has built in collaboration with Log Ladies. Read more

When you want to listen to inspiring people talking about their cause

• Attend the morning assembly on FLOKKR, arranged by the organization RØST. Activist Emma Holten is the host and will present a line of young speakers, delivering food for thought. Read more
• The war in Ukraine is affecting us all. At FLOKKR you can meet representatives from Ukrainian-Danish Youth House, who will talk about solidarity during the war and how they try to create a democratic platform and support activism across the two countries. Read more
• Come have a chat with members of Copenhagen’s Free Promoters about creating festive safe spaces and what is new in the Copenhagen underground. Read more
• Listen to an inspiring talk from some of the climate crisis’ front fighters in both Europe, the Amazon and Africa about how we can make a difference together. Read more

When you need a little break

• Outhabitants is hosting a workshop focusing on taking a step back and healing together. If you feel like it, you can also work with consent and simple body manipulations with the other participants, but you are also welcome to just be. Read more
• Ambereum is a scene that also functions as a hideout, an oasis and a place to discover new sound and performance formats in the middle of the buzzing festival, all dressed in orange and amber. Read more
• If you feel the need to ground your body after some hectic days of festival, then come experience Linda Lamignan with guests, and let their performative and meditative concert give you a break. Read more

When you want to listen to music with a twist

• The Nature of Isolation and Loneliness is a performative examination and manifestation of isolation and loneliness. It is a work consisting of 10 choir voices created by the duo Philip | Schneider and the Finish installation artist Hans Rosenström. Read more
• At Ambereum you can hear the sound artist and DJ Ilyich who, dressed in sensational costumes, will give a concert that switches between recognizable electronical music and abstract sound improvisations. Read more
• Attend a mind-bending musical experience, when Kim Mejdahl (yes, the one from Kunsterkolonien!) will lay down Ambereum with wild electronical music and fantastic visuals. Read more
• Do you know what post tonal musical theory is? If yes, then you know that is it dope, if no then it is about time to find out! Hear the duo Labour play a completely different kind of electronical music at Ambereum.Read more
• Listen to a DJ set and an interview med the people behind UUMPHFF, where they will talk about their mission of creating alternative spaces for marginalized groups in music. Read more
• At this concert, musician Sahsa Perera will juggle between the intimate, the epic and the apocalyptic. Poly rhythmical elements melts together with mutating and partially improvised vocals. It is going to be wild and weird and great. Read more