Welcome to Kunstsatellitten. Program 2026

We invite artists to explore what it means to create art in and for a neighborhood. Visitors are welcome to take part in workshops, conversations, and discoveries – and to witness art as it evolves.

What's happening now

Below you’ll find an overview of current and upcoming events. Every month this fall, you can drop by one of our projects at Satellitten. For more information, see 'Events at Kunstsatellitten' for each of the upcoming projects. There you will also find the current opening hours of the project space.

Program 2026

January: Imprints and Reliefs

We begin the year by looking at our local surroundings with fresh eyes. Together, we collect small objects from nature and the area around Sletten Shopping Centre – things that have been lost, forgotten, or overlooked. These are cast in plaster and become small imprints and reliefs that show traces of everyday life around us.

February: Årstad Upper Secondary School – Paper Lamps

Would you like to make your own paper lamp? Together with art students from Årstad Upper Secondary School, you can take part in a workshop where we create lamps out of paper. We explore light and form, and you get an insight into how young artists develop ideas and make art. Kunstsatellitten will also be filled with the students’ own paper lamps and decoration proposals.

March: Linda Ebert – We can’t find the woods while hiding in the trees

Here, the audience is invited to help transform the space. Using coloured tape, we create lines and shapes directly on walls and floors. The installation changes over time as more people contribute, showing how a space can slowly be transformed.

April: BAS – Neighbour

Students from the Bergen School of Architecture (BAS) invite neighbors and passersby to explore and use the spaces of Slettebakken together. Starting from how the area is used today, the project brings new life to both outdoor and shared spaces through simple creative actions, food, film, and shared activities. The project develops over time and creates opportunities for meeting, participation, and being together in different ways.

May: Petra Rahm – Creatures of Slettebakken

Petra has collected local stories that have become magical creatures that only appear when it rains. The illustrations are sprayed onto the ground using a special paint that becomes visible in wet weather. Join an adventurous discovery walk in your own neighbourhood!

June: Marianne Wie – Blue Spring

Marianne Wie invites the public to workshops where we create blue and white images using sunlight and plants from the local area. The prints become part of a shared exhibition in Kunstsatellitten that grows throughout the month. You can take part once or several times.

July: Exhibition – Shifts

by Solveig Sumire Sandvik and Eli Lea
Shifts

Can rubbish be art?

In July, the Art Satellite is filled with hundreds of everyday objects recovered from the former landfill at Slettebakken (1940–1960). Everything from decayed nylon stockings to children's shoes has been brought back into the light by artists Solveig Sumire Sandvik and Eli Lea.

The exhibition title, Shifts, refers precisely to this process: What happens to the value of an object when it is moved from a rubbish dump into an exhibition space? By organizing and assembling the recovered items in new ways, the artists explore whether things we once discarded can acquire new meaning and value for us today.

This is a living exhibition that evolves and changes over the course of its run.

Opening Hours:

The Art Satellite is closed for its regular programme during July, but the door remains open for conversation and shared exploration whenever the artists are present and working.

August: Frantzsen & Mjanger – Archive of Breath

Everyone breathes.
We all share the air
around us,
inside us.
How can this invisible community become visible?

"Archive of Breath – Sletten" is a place-specific art and outreach project in which audiences are invited to co-create an archive together with the artist duo Frantzsen&Mjanger (Maria Almås Frantzsen and Ruth Hol Mjanger). The project builds on their long standing work with breath as an artistic and relational material, and develops further the experiences from "Archive of Breath – Nordnes" (Hordaland Art Centre, 2023).

The artistic event happens in the moment: breath, form, reflection and archiving happen simultaneously in the space and in community. Audiences can, in dialogue with the artists, take part in three different workshops. They can materialise an Inprint of breath in glass in an outdoor Glassblowing Workshop, reflect on air as an invisible fellowship in a Word Play Workshop, or create and test out instructions in a Performance Workshop. The exploration will have a playful approach through interaction with materials, with language and with one another. Participation is accessible and requires no prior experience.

The archive gradually takes shape in Kunstsatellitten and remains visible throughout the entire period. The project investigates how intangible experiences such as breath, presence and relation can be given form, stored and shared. The artists and KODE's staff will actively present the growing archive to audiences.

The project concludes with the performance "Breath Bearers", 29 August, 12–14, around Sletten centre. The co-created performance is open to all and activates the archive as a shared, bodily experience in public space.

"Archive of Breath – Sletten" is also an artistic development project supported by NLA University College and Frantzsen Mjanger DA. Ruth Hol Mjanger, associate professor in drama, art and culture, is researching how contemporary art can be co-created with a diverse audience in a shopping centre, and how the formal expression of the archive carries traces of both the artists and the audiences involved.

September: Folk Music in Motion

What happens when folk music the everyday spaces around us?

Throughout September, the Art Satellite and Sletten Centre will be filled with the sounds, stories, and traditions of folk music. Through pop-up concerts, instrument displays, dance performances, and encounters between musicians and visitors, the programme explores folk music as a living cultural practice that continues to evolve. The programme is presented in collaboration with Kode's composer-in-residence Benedikte Maurseth and the Ole Bull Academy in Voss. 

Visitors may encounter folk music in unexpected places: in elevators, near the nursing station, throughout the shopping centre, or inside the Art Satellite itself. Traditional instruments will be on display, instrument makers will share their craft, and local singers, dancers, and folk musicians will contribute performances and activities throughout the month. 

Folk Music Month is not only about listening; it is about participation. Through conversations, shared experiences, and informal performances, visitors are invited to explore how music creates community across generations and backgrounds.

The month's highlight is Klubb Komle on 25 September: an evening where folk music meets club culture, DJs, dancing, and new audiences in a festive blend of tradition and contemporary culture.

Opening hours: information to come

October: Lars Jonsson – The Art-lit Baba Guru Guide

The Art-lit Baba Guru Guide Goes Slettebakken is an installation in which donated, loaned, and in some cases purchased artworks with a history or connection to Slettebakken interact with an alternative audio guide.

Imagine a museum guide in audio format – a soundtrack designed to describe, inform, and provide background information about selected artworks. In this particular scenario, however, the guide has been written and recorded by someone who has just returned from an ayahuasca retreat in Peru. This gives the audio track its spiritual and guru-inspired flavour, though always with a sense of humour and a twinkle in the eye. The guide playfully blends the personal with the local, weaving the two together in unexpected ways.

The project's main character is Baba Jörgen DASS-hus, whose voice guides visitors through the local artworks exhibited in KODE’s project space, the Art Satellite at Sletten Centre.

Free admission – drop-in.

Step 1: Bring a sculpture, drawing, or painting and submit it to KODE’s Art Satellite at Sletten Centre (1–11 October).

Step 2: The exhibition is installed and assembled in the Art Satellite (12–15 October).

Step 3: Come and experience how the audio guide interacts with the submitted artworks – a meeting between the local and the personal, infused with humour and playful storytelling (16–30 October).

Opening Hours:

Monday: 16:30–19:30
Tuesday: 12:00–15:00
Wednesday: 12:00–15:00 and 16:30–19:30
Thursday: 12:00–15:00
Friday: 12:00–15:00
Saturday: 12:00–16:00

About the Project

Kode’s Art Satellite is a long-term initiative led by Kode’s Education Department, with the goal of including even more people in our art spaces.

"We want to explore new ways of connecting art and society. The Art Satellite gives us the opportunity to be present where people live, act in real time, and allow art to develop in interaction with the place."

– Petter Snare, Director of Kode, and Siri Breistein, Director of Education at Kode.

"Over the next two years, the Art Satellite will be based in Sletten, and the shopping center is the perfect place to be. The center has a diverse audience and visibility at the heart of the neighborhood. We look forward to getting started," says Siri Breistein, Head of Education at Kode.

"The museum should be accessible to everyone, and we want to make it easier to experience art. We are now expanding the art and music experiences we offer and bringing them into the neighborhoods – what can art mean in the local community?" asks Kode’s Director, Petter Snare.

The Art Satellite project is made possible thanks to the support of the Kaare Berg Foundation, Sparebankstiftelsen SR-Bank, and the City of Bergen, and we are grateful for the collaboration with Sletten Senter, which has made premises available.

From the project space at Sletten Senter, local residents will be able to closely follow the process of the Art Satellite and be invited to workshops, activities, and conversations.

The Art Satellite is inspired by various community art programs, which are a large international movement but have not gained a strong foothold in Bergen.

Community art is about creating art in collaboration between artists and the local community, with a focus on building relationships and strengthening a sense of belonging.

More About the Project

The Art Satellite builds on Kode’s long-standing work for diversity and inclusion. Through collaborations with organizations such as Bergen Prison, Bergen Women’s Health Association, the Church City Mission, and Support Not Protect, Kode has opened its doors to new audiences and developed new initiatives.

Between 2024 and 2026, the Art Satellite will be based at Slettebakken in the Årstad district. The next Art Satellite is planned to move to a new neighborhood after the Slettebakken period, but the location has not yet been confirmed.

Read more about Kode’s educational and outreach work here.

Contacts

Project Manager: Maike Aarebrot Flick – maike.flick@kodebergen.no

Director of Education, Kode: Siri Breistein – siri.breistein@kodebergen.no

Project Assistant: Mouhcine El Khamlichi - mouhcine.khamlichi@kodebergen.no