Occupying the entire building—from façade and foyer to exhibition spaces and the spaces in between—the exhibition brings together artists whose practices engage with support from sculptural, ergonomic, emotional, social, institutional and analytical perspectives. Works recur throughout the building, encountering one another in changing constellations and creating new ways of thinking about what holds us up.

Some artists explore how weight and mass are supported by physical structures; others consider the body as architecture, or how childhood and relations of care shape us. Others turn to the infrastructures of the art field: the manual labour that makes exhibitions possible, questions of accessibility, and the economic systems that sustain artistic practice.

An archival room focuses on the “Artists’ Actions” of 1974, when artists across disciplines came together to advocate for liveable economic basis for artists. The structures that emerged from these actions continue to underpin the Norwegian art field today.

By focusing on relationships rather than isolated entities, Support Structures challenges divisions between art and craft, art and design, form and function, and the work and its frame. It also questions the idea of the artist as a lone individual, instead recognising our fundamental dependence on people, systems and care.

Support Structures is an attempt to look at what lifts, what holds, and what makes things possible.

Marte Aas, Sigurd Bronger, Thyra Dragseth, Agnes Guttormsgaard & Vebjørn Guttormsgaard Mellberg, Marianne Heier, Kunstneraksjon-74, Fabiola Burgos Labra, Éva Mag, Park McArthur, Eline Mugaas, Ketil Nergaard, Nettopp Nettverk (Ella Aandal, Kjetil Berge, Sigrid Høyforsslett Bjørbæk), Peter Opsvik, Kaare Ruud, Tove Storch

The exhibition is made possible with support from Stiftelsen Fritt Ord, Sparebankstiftelsen DNB, Flanders State of the Art (KIOSK), Bergesenstiftelsen and Talent Norge.