The word haunt originally meant “to visit someone’s home—whether with good or ill intent,” tracing back to the Old Norse heimsǿkja or sǿkja heim.

In this choreographic installation, Fiksdal and Siljeholm delve into the archives of Kunstnernes Hus, tracing the institution’s almost 100-year trajectory. They explore the frameworks that have shaped the house and its art—how these structures have taken form in the institution as a workplace, as a national and international exhibition venue, and as part of public debates around Norwegian art and cultural policy. In Haunted House, the forces surrounding the institution—funding bodies, the board, critics, and the artists themselves—are reimagined and embodied as “haunting” presences.

The work is created in collaboration with composer and sound designer Liv Kristin Holmberg and Therese Næss Disen, scenographer Signe Becker, and co-creating performers Pernille Holden, Louis Schou-Hansen, and Sunniva Vikør Egenes. The script, drawn from the Kunstnernes Hus archive, is performed by actors Tobias Santelmann, Oddgeir Thune, Gisken Armand, Birgitte Larsen, and Nils Johnson. Lighting design is by Martin Myrvoll.

Helle Siljeholm (b. 1981) is an artist and choreographer based in Oslo, currently working on a PhD at the Oslo National Academy of the Arts. Her artistic practice spans film, installation, sculpture, choreography, and performance. Her research project explores geological entities such as mountains and land formations, as well as their intertwining of people, nature, and culture within geological time, the present, and possible futures. Siljeholm's artistic work, research, and practice have been deeply influenced by ten years of collaboration on various artistic projects in the Middle East (Lebanon, Palestine, and Jordan).

Ingri Fiksdal (b. 1982) is a choreographer based in Oslo. She holds a PhD in artistic research from the Oslo National Academy of the Arts and is an affiliated researcher in the CoFutures project at the University of Oslo. Fiksdal works with choreography as a format for speculative fiction that can propose complex and diverse understandings of body, gender, species, knowledge, and history. She is currently working on a piece for The Bentway in Toronto in collaboration with director Jonas Corell Petersen.