How do we memorise the invisible through the rooms we leave behind?

 Using an ancient memory system – the Memory Palace technique – you are asked to remember a list of nine words all related to climate change. Visualising your own memory palace, you mentally wander from room to room while placing associative images along your path that represent each word. Furthermore, you try to shift the often-negative connotation of climate change related words to a more positive valence by forming new connections to the words and/or possible solutions to today’s challenges. Finally, you are asked to share your imaginings and experiences in an experiential interview.

Memories of the Invisible developed as a collaboration between Helene Nymann, visual artist and artistic research fellow at the Interacting Minds Centre (Aarhus University, DK), and Katrin Heimann, assistant professor at the Interacting Minds Centre. Nymann has created a video installation reflecting on the ancient Greek mnemonic system, known as the Memory Palace technique. Her work, 

, is part of a series of works looking at both human and non-human memory systems that open up to alternative ways of remembering and imagining a sustainable future. Heimann has worked extensively on aesthetic experience and is interested in developing how precisely arts and science can contribute to a sustainable change of the individual and society, specifically around climate change. She is furthermore trained in a special interviewing technique assessing subjective experience and with this has previously worked on the topic of memory and confabulation.

Teaming up, we found that not only did we share many of the same concerns, but we also had a strong belief in the creative powers of memory. Thus, we wondered what would happen if words relating to the environmental crisis were to be addressed through this ancient memory technique. Would interviewing people using this technique help us learn about participants' thoughts and feelings around climate change?

What if we, furthermore, invited a focus on constructing positive associations and narratives in particular? Could the task animate to renegotiate spontaneous reactions? And what would the strategies for doing so be? Last, but not least, how does such an experience of focusing on, reliving, and sharing intimate experiences with others effect participants themselves?

In a nutshell, we hoped to construct a space for shared mind-wandering where the explication and exploration of our imaginative and intellectual powers could foster more sustainable futures.

Light and noise and excitement flooded the experimental space in the Blavatnik Building of Tate Modern, so it was our first task to create a relaxing space with not much more than two couches, chairs, tables, and a flat screen at hand. Once we prepared what could look like a room within a room, we were ready to remember the invisible!

Upon arrival, Tate Exchange visitors were invited to watch Nymann's video work and were informed about the Memory Palace technique. They were further invited to join us in exploring the Memory Palace technique themselves. Asked to do so in pairs, some knew each other and some did not. Before starting the task, we made them aware of our aims: We engaged them in our suspicion that human memory deploys extraordinary imaginative abilities and that these abilities might be used to reach a much-needed goal – opening up to alternative ways of remembering and living a more sustainable future. Only then did we guide the participants into their memory palaces and through the list of nine words/terms specifically related to climate change.

After completion, we invited participants to share their mental journey with us and their partners, using an interview technique inspired by micro-phenomenology. Lastly, we debriefed the experience, allowing for comparisons and generalisations among their and others' journeys – and we often saw participants continuing the discussion elsewhere. In describing their experiences to us, participants showed immense engagement and excitement, not only due to the fact of having remembered all nine words but also due to what they had visualised and experienced. They felt inspired and engaged.

In guiding participants through their individual memory palaces – in which they created positive associations in connection to climate change related terms – we were interested in what narratives, reactions, and imaginings would emerge. We wondered whether participants would shift their relation to their own inner mechanisms of remembering and imagining the present and/or future. Would the conscious and creative act of approaching such biases contribute to a dialogue around possible solutions to these problems? Would they experience a sense of trust or even spurred creativity within themselves? How would participants retell their memories, and what would happen in the sharing of these narratives? Would an experiment, which asks for a good amount of trust and intimacy, even be possible in the quite-noisy conditions of the Tate and under the circumstances that participants would not have much time to get to know us, the method, or their partners? Last, but not least, would they enjoy the experience? Did you?

Starting with the last question, we were amazingly surprised by the mental effort invested and the trust participants granted us from the very beginning. While doing the memory task, they showed high levels of concentration, often closing their eyes, only to open them upon completion. This gesture repeated itself when they consequently relived and retraced their journey in the experimental interviews. Despite the event's far-from-ideal conditions of space and time, the gesture of closing their eyes showed us that participants were able to direct their attention to the task and without hesitation share their intimate experiences with us and their allocated partner. Their expressions indeed mirrored that they took the experiment as a playful challenge and that the process they went through was positive and even amusing at times. They also seemed to really enjoy sharing their experiences and listening to the journeys of others (and reported that they did so). The task, thus, seems to be a successful tool for our purpose. It shows us that it motivated participants externally, by its quiz-like nature, as well as internally, by giving the freedom to memorise the words in any manner found stimulating, all the while, the context of the memory palace created an associative framework in which one could actually be surprised by the upcoming images. Lastly, this surprise seems to be held on the perfect level, with the chosen memory palace often being a positively associated space, such as a childhood home, which elicited the feeling of safety and nostalgia.

But what did participants talk about? How did they memorise the images, and what about the task to change their internal images into associations of positive valence?

The data we collected indicates at least three ways that the given terms were memorised through the Memory Palace technique.

 Participants used a room of their memory palace as a 

 for their visual associations connected to the term to be memorised. For example, the term 'deforestation' elicited one participant to imagine the interior of their living room being completely replaced by a field of tree stumps.

a concrete existing object already existing within the room

 of their memory palace with the respective term. For example, the term 'deforestation' could be connected to the oak table within their living room.

 of their memory palace associated with the respective term. Interestingly, the connection between this object and the actual term could seem quite random; it could simply be a phonological link. For example, the term 'drought' elicited the image of a doughnut on the living room table, due to the phonological similarity between the sounds of the words 'doughnut' and 'drought'. While some participants reported that such associations were born out of a difficulty to come up with any imagination, others told us that this was just the most immediate idea that came to them. Noticeable to us, this type of association was the most common.

Interestingly, participants solved our second task – to construct images of positive valence – with an ease that admittedly surprised us.

In some cases, this was due to the fact that the initial association did not ask for any transformation as it was intrinsically positive. For example, a doughnut might have intrinsically positive connotations. Similarly, the oak table one participant associated with deforestation was reported as a 'beloved piece of furniture that would not exist without deforestation'. Such reasoning obviously bears some shortcomings (not all wooden furniture implies deforestation), which, however, were not at all of importance for the given task.

The biggest transformative effort was required for associations of type 

 – that spontaneously led to an image of negative valence that was of a very different kind. For example, 'plastic garbage', led several participants to directly translate the word into scenes of an overflowing plastic garbage can in the kitchen, leading to a negative response as they became annoyed by it literally trashing and smelling in the kitchen. In another example from the given words, the word 'deforestation' led to an image of a deforested rainforest, causing much more grave concerns about the state of our world and the environment.

Respectively, the solutions were also of a quite different nature. For 'plastic garbage', a positive valence was reached by imagining a personal action, such as bringing the virtual garbage to the recycling bin, a thought that left the participant with a feeling of satisfaction. On the other hand, images of a deforested rainforest were turned positive by several participants thinking of a solution executed by others, such as reforestation projects that they had heard of through media or that they had personally visited. There were also slight indications that the feelings caused by the latter kind of larger-scale solutions were slightly more mixed (such as respect for the project but also fears that the efforts were not enough), but with this kind of transformation being much rarer in the data, we had too little evidence to be sure of this. Most surprisingly to us, it was very rare that participants came up with a creative new solution for an encountered negative association – with the exception of some participants imagining building an artistic sculpture out of plastic garbage, although this was reportedly inspired by having seen artworks made from garbage.

First interpretations and further ideas for development

To conclude, thus, our experiment showed the task as highly motivating and leading to vivid associations of very different kinds. However, most experiences were focused around the memorisation aspect of the task, while the creative solution aspect of the work was put in the background.

It was therefore our suspicion that this might be due to the Memory Palace technique enforcing the memorisation part of the task, thus motivating participants to go for the most effective association rather than to spend much energy focusing on associated feelings and further transformations. To test if this was indeed so, we ran a modified experiment at Aarhus University a few weeks later, in July 2019. In this version we omitted the memory palace framework, purely giving participants the climate change related words, asking them to attend to their associations and – if necessary – to turn them into something of positive valence. Indeed, reports differed considerably. To give just a quick impression, firstly, not having the architectonic framework and structure of the memory palace technique allowed for more abstract and freer associations. These ranged from vivid and complex memories of climate change related phenomena known from media coverage, to imaginations of plastic garbage piling up in one’s personal mental inner space, leading to feelings of suffocation and despair. Secondly, most of these associations were very negative in valence, with participants simply unable to find a solution to transform the negative connotations. Thirdly, attempts at transformation again included solutions known from media or personal experience, however, and maybe most interestingly, these attempts reportedly did not lead to a positive valence very often. On the contrary, reasons why they found that their solutions were not satisfactory seemed to come up repeatedly, leading participants to experience raising frustration and even hopelessness as well as the feeling that the task was unfeasible – which altogether creates a very different picture than the first version of the experiment.

Memories of the Invisible 

Throughout 2026, Helene Nymann is developing a site-specific public art commission for a Dementia-Friendly Garden at Rigshospitalet, Denmark’s national hospital in Copenhagen.


The project is initiated by the Danish Dementia Research Centre (DDRC) in collaboration with IN SITU

Nymann’s artworks form a sensory landscape of interactive and sculptural elements that blend art and science to foster an atmosphere of presence, care, and interdisciplinary exchange. The garden aims to challenge taboos surrounding dementia-related illnesses, opening space for new forms of memory-sharing and connection.

Designed as a place to slow down, the garden invites visitors to engage in storytelling, co-remembering, and leaving gentle traces for those who follow creating a living, evolving space of shared experience. The garden lives and breathes as a collective memory in motion.

While the design of the garden have already been made by a garden architect, Nymann artworks are created on the basis of interdisciplinary perspectives to further our understanding of memory and time. For this work, Nymann is, therefore, working closely with health professionals and researchers to ensure that the garden is both a place for aesthetic and artistic reflection and for therapeutic and pedagogic development. 

Nymann use workshops and evaluations with the users of the garden to determine how the garden can create a sense of community and belonging, create space for interaction with the artworks and offer new experiences across temporalities. At the workshops Nymann employs the ancient Roman memory technique 

which also features in other exhibitions such as 

Furthermore, the first work in the garden titled "P(l)ace of P(l)aces" (2025) demonstrate a map of Denmark showing all the danish waterways - both artificial and natural. As navigation stones from around Denmark where collected by patients, relatives and staff. The stones where carved into round marble-balls (lending the analogy of the creode, a portmanteau and concept developped by C.H. Waddington). 

Workshops and interactions will follow as part of the ongoing participation of this map in motion. More stones will be collected and placed on the map and in the garden. 

Den Demensvenlige Have is part of the project “everyday life with dementia”. The garden itself is built upon four different topics, which all accommodates the user's needs: Calmness, wildlife, activity and togetherness. Touch, sound, interaction and movement are also key elements in the artworks as well as the integration of elements that stimulate the senses like trickling water and colorful and fragrant plants. These elements also attract butterflies, insects and birds. The garden is thereby a dynamic and engaging experience for all senses, opening up for reinvigorating memories and for dialogue between users and visitors of the garden.

Den Demensvenlige Have is an art project and a testimony to how presence, care and interdisciplinary collaboration between art and science can create sustainable and meaningful spaces and memories. Thereby, the garden stands as a place for therapeutic reflection and as a model for similar initiates nationally and internationally.



 works with research, education and dissemination on dementia for professionals across sectors in Denmark. 

 acts as artistic advisor for Den Demensvenlige Have. Initial research and sketches were funded by 

 in an interview with Helene Nymann on the research, process and view on memory and time. Published by DDRC, 2025.

P(l)ACE OF P(I)ACES 

BEARING (Berlin) (2025) is a site-specific, interactive video and sound installation that reads Berlin less as a geographic location than as a temporal field. Moving through the city’s waterways, architectures, and reflective surfaces, the work positions Berlin as an environment where multiple durations overlap: geological, botanical, historical, technological, and personal.

The video begins at the Neue Nationalgalerie and follows the River Spree to its confluence with the Havel, concluding beneath 

—a tree presumed to be more than a thousand years old. As a being older than the city itself, the tree functions as a material anchor point: a living witness that exceeds human memory, political change, and the city’s reconstructed image of itself. In this encounter, the linearity of time loosens. Berlin is not presented as a sequence of events, but as an entanglement of pasts and speculative futures carried simultaneously in the urban landscape.

Throughout the film, surfaces behave as temporal mirrors. Water, glass, and stone hold transient inscriptions of the city, while a fog-like presence periodically obscures and consumes the image. Instead of cinematic continuity, the installation offers intervals: moments in which the viewer occupies a space of suspension, neither entirely present nor outside of time. In these interruptions, text surfaces—statements contributed by visitors in response to a sculptural work situated beside the screen.

The sculpture belongs to Nymann’s ongoing series Hippocampus Hippocampi, which explores the hippocampus as both biological organ and conceptual figure. The hippocampus is the site where long-term memory consolidates, where spatial orientation is formed, and where mental time travel becomes possible. In the installation, this brain structure becomes a physical interface. A QR code engraved on its surface invites visitors to answer the question:
“What do you remember that you want the future to remember?”

This prompt leads to an interactive platform, 

, in which memories are deposited and marked with emotional coordinates. More than 3,000 entries now form an expanding database. Crucially, these contributions do not remain external to the artwork; they are absorbed into the video itself. Each new memory enters the moving image as a brief apparition—sentences drifting across the screen like signals from another time. Thus, the installation is never fixed. It is continuously rewritten by those who encounter it.

In this sense, BEARING resists closure. It operates as a living archive whose authorship is distributed and porous. The work’s structure acknowledges that memory is not static, and that the future is not a blank field awaiting inscription but something shaped by collective acts of remembering. By folding image, sound, text, and viewer participation into a single temporal loop, the installation proposes a different understanding of duration: one in which time is not a line, but a confluence—of human and nonhuman histories, fragile traces and speculative inheritances.

As BEARING travels to new cities and contexts, it continues to gather voices, emotions, and futures. What emerges is not only a portrait of Berlin, but a shifting cartography of memory itself: an archive of those who were here, those who are here now, and those yet to come

Installation shot by Yanina Isla, Neue National Gallery, 2025

BEARING 

Rental car, AI chatbot, dataset from continuon.us, mixed media
Courtesy of the artist.

In a rented car, visitors encounter an AI-generated chatbot that speaks in the artist’s own voice. However, the voice is not based on Nymann’s personal memories, but on the thousands of statements and “memories for the future” that have already been—and will continue to be—submitted to the digital platform continuon.us.

The intimate space of the car creates a special situation: here one can speak calmly with the work, explore the collected memories, and listen to how those who came before interpret and process the time we live in and the time that lies ahead. Visitors may ask questions, share concerns, seek advice—or simply explore the metareflections and contributions that the chatbot operates from, the many memories that together help shape our shared future memories

In the exhibition Memography – Autobiography, Helene Nymann presents three works: Long Road Ahead (Ringsted Rider) (2025), Hippocampus Hippocampi (2023), and Carte de ContinuOnus (2023–?).  What unites these works is an exploratory approach to memory—not only as something individual and private, but as something shaped and shared across time, technology, and communities. Nymann works with a collective form of autobiography, in which present-day memories and imaginings create traces that can be discovered and interpreted in future times—by humans as well as non-human actors.  The works invite the audience to take an active part in this process: to reflect on their own life experiences, but also to contribute to a shared platform of memories, where individual narratives can grow together into a larger landscape of possible futures.

Long Road Ahead 

 is part interactive website and part public sculpture. 

 is part interactive website, part public sculpture and part video installation, and was first presented in the exhibition 

at Copenhagen Contemporary in 2023. The artwork is inspired by the 

, a ‘map of tenderness’ created by French writer Madeleine de Scudéry and her group of friends in 1653–54, which soon after appeared as an engraving in Scudéry’s novel 

 depicted a bird’s-eye view of an allegorical landscape with features named for different emotions. It was made at a time when the author and her circle were tackling quite radical questions of self-determination, women’s rights, and how an individual’s interiority can have consequences for society at large. The river running through the 

 follows the outlines of a uterus, further linking the psycho-geographic map to the female body as a site of journey and reflection.

you are immediately invited to answer this question: ‘What do you want the future to remember?’. 

Each person can type a response in a text-input field, with the option to include their name and/or location. After submitting their memory, the user is taken to a colourful adaptation of the 

: its original borders stretch outwards in an elaborate digital patchwork of saturated marks whose patterns riff on the central landscape motifs. When one zooms out, the map’s uneven edges evoke a tiled collage and suggest that its construction could still continue. Zooming out even further triggers a shift from a flat view to the same map wrapped like a skin around a 3D digital object.


The object is a sculptural interpretation of the hippocampus, the part of the human brain that stores memories. In its formal ambiguity, the object also feels suggestive of a back-bending female figure, or a model of the human clitoris organ, creating a rhyme with the shape and association of the 

’s uterus-like river. 

When the user zooms back in, word tags, in English, are visible across the flat map, tying different locations to different emotions, as Scudéry’s cohort did centuries ago. A second question unfurls across the screen: ‘If your memory was found in the future, how do you think it would make the future feel?’ The user is then prompted to place their statement on the map, effectively attaching it to one or more emotions and contributing to the collective 

. By merging them into one, it proposes that the future, which is always already entangled in the past, carries with it obligations and responsibilities. The English word 

 refers to ‘something that is one’s duty or responsibility’ and is often culturally understood with a negative valence. In an individualist society, 

 can suggest obligations that diminish one’s personal freedom and, as such, one’s future. 

However, in a more collective-minded framework, freedom is not always freedom from obligations and relations, but something that assumes that individuals and communities flourish through interdependence. 

 is an attempt to reclaim our shared onus as a privilege that unfolds from the present into the future. The stories we assign to words, like maps, orient our worldviews.

 to place their memories for the future, the cumulative meshwork of collective memories gives further shape to the dynamic map, which stands as a metaphor for future directions, movements, and response-ability. 

As contributors place their memories on the map, they imagine how future others might come to feel about each memory. A new space is opened up – a space for questions and reflections about what and which kind of future the user attributes their memory to. By building on these collective reflections, users are prompted to imagine other futures, and perhaps also actions that could be taken today to achieve those possibilities.

"The Cognitive Neuroscience of Constructive Memory"

 

Interview with Helene Nymann by Stine Lundberg Hansen in Art Matter, 

Helene Nymann: "Den viden, der kommer ud af kunst, er reel viden"

Carte de ContinOnus is an interactive artwork consisting of a sculptural video installation, three public sculptures placed in different locations and an interactive website

Carte de ContinuOnus 

is part interactive website, part public sculpture and part video installation. Forming and framing an ever malleable map of memories for the futures.

 (2023) is projected onto a semi-transparent scrim suspended from the ceiling. The video work opens with a slow, sweeping scan of the 17th-century 

, a map originally created by French writer Madeleine de Scudéry and her circle of friends, 

A voice-over emerges, recounting the map’s origins before shifting into a call to action:

"Time has come to create another collective map—a map visualizing what we remember that we want the future to remember. An attempt to intentionally leave traces that might move those who come after. As an act of our love."

The voiceover continues, weaving through a series of dreamlike, painterly, and associative images. These include imagery of mnemonic knots, fragments of the artist’s own family footage, and staged scenes set in both rural and urban environments across time. As the video unfolds, central figures appear and disappear, drifting seamlessly in and out of the frame. The voice returns with a reflective question:

"If your memory was found in the future how do you think it would make the future feel?"

 where this work was first made, can be found at 

Additional research that supports and informs this work

Future ContinuOnus

What does a knot tied hundreds of years ago tell us? In the act of remembering and forgetting, what part does the body play? What does it mean that our bodies are plastic and that we therefore can change our patterns of thought and behavior throughout life? And how do we access the many layers that comprise the mechanisms of memory? These questions – and many more – form the basis for the solo exhibition 

(Mesh Mother) three bodies are interwoven in knotty postures, just as in the Scandinavian schoolyard game Kluddermor (which can be translated as messy mother or mesh-mother). The movements are inspired by the khipu, an ancient memory tool consisting of a chain-shaped system of knotted strings used by the Incas. Some scholars believe that these knots worked as a counting system, while others perceive the knots as three-dimensional writing—an accumulation of knowledge and stories. Projected onto a semitransparent screen the video entangles itself with the room and the viewer.

 consists of handblown glass-containers, which are placed on a bed of soil. They draw ties with the khipu knot, an ancient Incan memory tool composed of knotted and colored strings. While some view the khipu as a counting device, others regard it as a form of three-dimensional writing – an accumulation of knowledge and stories. The title ‘Eidolons’, meaning phantoms or spirit images, encapsulates the work’s exploration of memory as a portal to all temporalities and perspectives simultaneously.

The knot shape also gives associations and is inspired by the sea slug Aplysia Californica, a tiny mollusk that through neurological studies have contributed to the detection of how human beings register and form memories in our nervous system through external stimuli.

With 

, Nymann invites the viewer to physically tie a knot of their own, choosing what they wish to remember thereby contributing to a collective memory and a future Eidolon altogether. Thereby, the exhibition encourages us to think about how we, as individuals remember, but also forget, and what we as a society leave behind for the ones who come after. 

 (Mesh Mother) (2022)
10:42 min HD video loop installation with sound, dimensions variable



 (2022)
Glas, steel, soil, waxed string with pigment, memories, imaginings



Cinematographer: Troels Rasmus Jensen DFF
Gaffer: Philip Sacht
Composer and Musician: Jeppe Brix
Dancers: Alma Toaspern, Hazuki Kajima, Jens Brøndum
Creative Consultant: Nadia Donnerborg
Post Production Coordinator: Bacon Production, Louise Ryge
Producer: The Lab, Emil Eskesen
Digital Post Production: Nordisk Film Shortcut
In-House Post Producer: Maggie Winther Hansen
Colorist: Nordisk Film Shortcut, Olesya Kireeva



Anders Raad Glass: Anders Raad
Holmegaard Glasværk
Glassblowers: Jonas Nöel Niedermann, Iben Kielberg, Peer Nielsen, Pierre Roger Ondongo, Lean Pedersen
Steel: Frank Jensen, Alvilde Holm



Professor: Head of Department, Culture and Society, Aarhus University, Andreas Roepstorff
Neuroscientist and Teacher of Microphenomenology: Karin Heimann
Writer: Siri Hustvedt
Cultural Anthropologist, Scientist: Joe Dumit
Curator at The Danish National Museum: Anne-Mette Marchen Andersen

Special thanks to choreographer and dancer, Tim Matiakis, Statens Værksteder for Kunst, O–Overgaden, family and friends, everyone who visited the exhibition and tied a knot

The exhibition

was supported by: 
Arne V. Schlesch's Foundation, Danish Arts Foundation, Beckett-Fonden and Novo Nordisk Foundation.

The publication "Knots of Ecphore" was published by O–Overgaden on the occasion of the exhibition with new text by novelist and essayist Siri Hustvedt, anthropologist Joseph Dumit and curator Aukje Lepotre. 

A readable version of the publication can be found here.

 (2022) 

Interview with Helene Nymann by Stine Lundberg Hansen in Art Matter, 

Knots of Ecphore reflects our present western linear approach to knowledge, language and memory, and also the systematic absence of the body when it comes to remembering

Knots of Ecphore 

 (2022) was created as part of the public art commission in the Nørreport area of Aabenraa, Denmark.

is a sculptural and interactive sound piece that is installed in a small passageway of the main shopping street. A series of 6 copper organ pibes are placed along the buildings of passageway and illuminated at night. The pibes are connected to two sensors registrating the interaction in the passageway - both human and non-human - following a certain level of interaction, the coming and going in the passageway, the pibes are automatically turned on and begin to play the chorus of the anti-war song 

by John Lennon (originally credited to Lennon-McCartney, 1969). 

(2022)
Copper organ pibes, aluminium, LED, LED-driver, fan, sensor



Organ builder: Marcussen & Søn
LED and programming: Studio Temporal

AabenraaOrgan is funded by Danish Arts Foundation, Den Jyske Kunstfond, BHJ Fonden and Aabenraa Kommune’s Art Council.

 (2022) draws inspiration from the historical organ pipe, an instrument traditionally associated with indoor settings and religious contexts. However, by placing the organ pipes outdoors and inviting passersby and those present to play them, Nymann shifts our focus to the present, emphasizing the agency of individuals within public spaces. By creating a framework for interaction, 

 encourages us to pause, listen, and participate in collective movements for peace amid the routines of everyday life.

 (Lennon-McCartney, 1969) was chosen by Nymann not only for its timeless message but also to reflect the specific historical moment in which the artwork was created—at the onset of the Russian invasion and war in Ukraine in February 2022. Additionally, the work resonates with the unique historical context of the Aabenraa region, a place marked by numerous conflicts over the shifting border between Denmark and Germany.

Looking ahead, other composers may be invited to create new melodies for the sound installation. This openness to change and collaboration allows the work to evolve over time, exploring how we form collective memories and imagine shared futures.

More information on the public art decoration can be found via Creator Projects  

AabenraaOrgan 

 (2022), are based on Nymann's studies of mnemonic techniques and genetic dynamics throughout history. Together, the sculptures and video engage in reflections on the relationship between genetics and memory, heritage and environment, past and future.

The artworks were created for the group exhibition 

Museum for Fremtiden / Museum for the Future 

– a visual arts exhibition and participatory theatre performance. 

(2022)
HD video, 10:47 min loop with sound, dimension variable



(2022)
164 x 158 x 72
Sand, paint metal, polystyrene, marble balls



(2022)
164 x 60 x 55
Sand, paint, metal, polystyrene, marble balls


, video, sculpture, and an invitation to sing converge in a quest to envision new landscapes—both inner and outer, human and more-than-human. The work draws inspiration from the ideas of biologist C.H. Waddington (1905–1975), a pioneer in the fields of epigenetics and evolutionary developmental biology. 

 explores Waddington’s concept of the "creode," a term he coined as a neologistic portmanteau from the Greek words 

 (path), representing the developmental pathways that cells follow as they differentiate and specialize into various forms and functions within an organism.

Waddington’s creode is often illustrated through his metaphor of a marble rolling down a contoured landscape, known as the “epigenetic landscape.” In this model, imagine multiple marbles set in motion at the top of a sloped surface. As they roll downward, their trajectories are shaped by the environment—defined by ridges, grooves, and valleys carved into the landscape. These pathways guide the marbles toward different resting points at the base, symbolizing the specific fates of cells as they undergo differentiation. The grooves represent developmental constraints and possibilities, showing how genetic potential is influenced, but not rigidly determined, by environmental factors.

This metaphor emphasizes that development is both dynamic and context-dependent, highlighting how small changes—such as genetic mutations or environmental influences—can shift developmental pathways and, over evolutionary timescales, alter the anatomy and function of organisms. 

 reflects on this metamorphic vision, inviting viewers to consider not only biological evolution but also how personal, cultural, and ecological landscapes are continuously shaped through interaction, adaptation, and transformation

Ode to Creode (2022). Stills from video work

presented alternatives to the sinister visions of the future which permeates our present time as it is faced with the doom of climate crisis. 

brought forth different ways to let ourselves reimagine our relationship with not only ourselves but also our age and place in history. 
The works reached back to primeval times, interventions with the processes of human biology and demonstrated that humanity is deeply connected and intertwined with other organisms and life forms. 


Cinematographer: Troels Rasmus Jensen, DFF
Colorist: Olesya Kireeva
Gaffer: Malik Thomas
Performers: Dorte Bjerre Jensen, Elijah Nagady, Kasper Jensen, Pierre Enaux, Snore Elvin
Styling and set-design: Nanna Rosenfeldt-Olsen
Costume: Prisca Vilsbol
Digital Post Production: Nordisk Film Shortcut
In-house Post Producer: Maggie Winther Hansen



was supported by: 
Aage og Johanne Louis-Hansens Fond, Aarhus Kommune, A.P. Møller og Hustru Chastine Mc-Kinney Møllers Fond til Almene Formaal, Augustinus Fonden, Bikubenfonden, Det Obelske Familiefond, Knud Højgaards Fond, New Carlsberg Foundation, Novo Nordisk, The Arts Council of Denmark and William Demant Fonden

. 

Artists: Helene Nymann, Ferdinand Ahm Krag, Studio ThinkingHand
Text and production:

Christian Lollike
Dramaturge and curator: Anders Thrue Djurslev
Light design: Morten Kolbak
Sound design: Asger Kudahl

The publication "Museum for Fremtiden / Museum of the Future" was published by Antipyrine on the occasion of the exhibition. 

A readable version of the conversation between Anders Thrue Djurslev and Helene Nymann to be found here.

Ode to Creode presents an exploration of the correlations between mnemonic techniques and genetic dynamics.

Ode to Creode

In Selva of Selves (S.O.S) we journey down through a liquid substance and encounter the sea-slug and famous laboratory animal, Aplysia Californica. 



(2019)
Video-animation, 05:00 min loop with sound, dimensions variable



Animation artist: Lasse Smith
Sound: Jeppe Brix

Used in scientific tests, Aplysia Californica, has helped pave the way for a deeper understanding of how human memories are created, supplying new information about memory storage, plasticity and even memory transfer. The special combination of the sea-slug’s simple nervous system, extraordinarily large sized neurons as well as its fascinating self-defense mechanism – a fuchsia-colored chemical liquid – makes it a powerful organism for us to learn from and with.

Selva of Selves (SoS) (2019). Stills from video

 we make a shift in perspective, as we in an almost Alice in Wonderland like fashion, disappear down through the opening of the slug’s siphon, arriving deep inside its pulsating nervous system. Thus, in a merge between art and neuroscience, the work opens up to a third space of perspective possibilities. A space of co-evolutionary imaginings and a space on the erogenous limits of perception and cognition.

Selva of Selves (S.O.S)

In an era where vast portions of our memory are externalized into digital storage and images flicker through our perception at high speeds, our engagement with memory has become increasingly transient—impressions forming and dissolving in an instant.

 explores the evolution of memory techniques, drawing inspiration from the works of Italian philosopher, poet, and cosmologist Giordano Bruno. Through a dialogue between past and future, the exhibition presents a video work and sculptures that delve into the intricate relationship between memory, consciousness, and technology.

By reinterpreting ancient mnemonic systems, 

 speculates on new ways of remembering and reimagining knowledge. It reflects on the fragility of memory in a world where technology mediates our recollections, while also proposing alternative ways to harness the power of remembrance. As past wisdom intersects with future possibilities, the exhibition invites us to rethink memory not just as a tool for recalling the past, but as a framework for envisioning a more sustainable future.


Aom Aom, your body in my room – Study of the hippocampus 

(2017)
Polystyrene, metal, white paint
210 m x 150 m x 190 m



 (2017)
11:20 min video loop with sound, single-channel video projection, dimensions variable

Memory Wheels (2019)


BE LUCK – Bruno’s Endless Love to a Universe of Circular Knowledge 


Metal, beeswax, red pigment, cyber chrome 
90 cm x 5 cm


– Aby Warburg Arranges a World of Empathy 


Metal, beeswax, green pigment, cyber chrome 
90 cm x 5 cm


M9MEMM – Mnemosyne and the Nine Muses Entranced in Mnemonic Meditations


Metal, beeswax, purple, cyber chrome 
90 cm x5 cm


TOTHM – Tip of my Tongue to Henry Molaison 


Metal, beeswax, blue pigment, cyber chrome 
90 cm x 5 cm



Metal, beeswax, white pigment, cyber chrome 
90 cm x 5 cm




Animation: Adam Ryde Ankerfeldt & Magnus Pind Bjerre
Cinematographer: Troels Rasmus Jensen
Colorgrade: Olesya Kireeva, Act3
Sound: Jeppe Brix 
Set-Design: Anne Mette Fisker Langkjer 

The exhibition

was supported by: 
Danish Arts Foundation, Aarhus Kommune, Det Obelske Familiefond, IMC – Interacting Minds Centre, Kjærgaard Anlægsgartner and Novo Nordisk Foundation

The publication "Ars Memoria – Memes for Imagination" was published by Really Simple Syndication Press on the occasion of the exhibition. 

 has been exhibited at New Museum in New York in 2019 as part of their 

 was organized by Helga Christoffersen, Associate Curator, and presents new video works by emerging artists. Read more about 

Ars Memoria – Memes for Imagination explores the notion of embodied knowledge, memory-systems and experimental forms of receiving and transmitting ideas

Ars Memoria – Memes for Imagination 

 features a classically trained ballet dancer performing movements inspired by Butoh, set against the backdrop of a falling sulfur-green and yellowish substance.

By blending these culturally distinct dance styles, the piece delves into the process of creation, exploring both bodily and cultural memory. Butoh, which emerged in 1959 in the aftermath of World War II, was developed through the collaboration of its key founders, Tatsumi Hijikata and Kazuo Ohno. Their work sought to create space for the expression of horror, trauma, and the absurdity of existence.

, Nymann invites a ballet dancer to move through the lens of Butoh, confronting cultural differences and challenging traditional perceptions of beauty. This juxtaposition draws attention to the physical processes of the body and the echoes of traumatic experiences. The work becomes a moving meditation on how we process history, endure hardship, and find beauty in the act of becoming.

Butoh is short for Ankoku Butoh, which can be translated into "dance of darkness",  a term used by the founder of the style, Tatsumi Hijikata. The term and dance style refer to the limitation of conscious movement and to the subconscious storage of bodily knowledge. Through the dance style, past experiences, which are stored within the body, can be channeled out as they are stimulated through bodily and cognitive movement. 

For 

, Helene Nymann gave the dance no other instructions than the principes of Butoh. Instead the dancer was asked to translate his own past – his own bodily knowledge – into movement.

By incorporating dance and movement the work investigates how bodily memory is stimulated by textures, physical sensations and interaction. Through sound and movement, 

also explores how memory is created, stored and, crucially, how it can be accessed again. 

has been exhibited at New Museum in New York in 2019 as part of their 

was organized by Helga Christoffersen, Associate Curator, and presents new video works by emerging artists. Read more about 

Whether We Are 

 explores the evocative power of archaic imagery and mythology, delving into how such visual and narrative elements can activate our subconscious, fostering a meditative and introspective state of mind. The work draws inspiration from the ancient Greek myth of Medusa—an enigmatic and tragic figure, both feared and revered. Medusa, a woman transformed into a monstrous being, possesses the power to petrify onlookers with a single gaze, turning them into stone—an act that metaphorically blurs the boundary between life and sculpture.

, Nymann interrogates the inherited interpretations of this myth within the framework of Western cultural history. The piece critically examines how Medusa’s image, continuously appearing and disappearing, challenges the mechanisms of cultural transmission. It reflects on the shifting dynamics of power and control between the observer and the observed, questioning who holds dominance in the act of looking and being looked at.

In this work, Medusa’s power is not simply reaffirmed but reimagined. Rather than a fixed symbol of destruction or victimhood, she becomes a fluid entity—one who oscillates between being the wielder of the gaze and the object of scrutiny. By doing so Nymann invites viewers to reconsider the implications of representation, perception, and agency in mythological and contemporary contexts alike.




Video installation HD video 16:9 [07:50 loop]




Filmed, edited and graded: Helene Nymann
Medusa: Diana Ø. Tørsløv Møller 
Set-design: Anne Mette Fisker Langkjer 
Sound: Jeppe Brix


has been presented at ARoS in the exhibition 

Mythologies – The Beginning and End of Civilizations 

in 2020. The exhibition featured 70 artworks that dealt with faith, hope, crises and revolution and about how the power of stories has created and changed societies throughout history - from the Greek myths to the present-day welfare state. Read more about the exhibition 

Head On My Dear

, 3 x silk-laminated c-print mounted on board. C-Print 70 x 90 cm

 (2014)
2 x channel video sculpture 16:9 HDV [10:39 min loop]



(2014)
Video-sculpture. Projection on fuchsia colored fabric. 16:9 HDV [02:23 min loop]



 (2014)
Video-sculpture, 16:9 HDV, (03.23 min loop)

In May 2012, a woman steps into the hushed corridors of an abandoned colonial-era hotel near Tahrir Square in Cairo. Filmed amidst the upheaval of the Arab Spring, the hotel becomes both a sanctuary and a battleground—a liminal space where history and the present moment converge. Within its crumbling walls, the echoes of past regimes and contemporary struggles intertwine, as the act of wandering from room to room transforms the architecture into a shifting landscape of memory, surveillance, and resistance. The gaze—both given and received—blurs the boundaries between observer and observed, between what must be confronted and what must be exorcised for new possibilities to emerge.

 is a multi-sensory, split-screen projection that unfolds through a dynamic interplay of image, sound, and materiality. It exists simultaneously as a screen-based work and as an installation projected onto fuchsia-colored fabric, where the moving images extend beyond their frames, dissolving into space. These video-sculptures invite an immersive experience, where the reverberating soundscapes wrap around the viewer, drawing them into the woman's journey. As she moves through the dilapidated interiors, the very structure of the hotel becomes an extension of her psychological state—both an externalized battlefield and an intimate space of transformation.

By merging physical and mental geographies, 

 reflects on the continuous cycle of revolution, the fluidity of spaces, and the thresholds we cross—both within ourselves and within history. It is an invitation to move, to look, to remember, and ultimately, to participate in the ongoing act of liberation.

Dancer: Karima Mansour
Set-design: Anne Mette Fisker Langkjer
Sound: Jeppe Brix

Supported by DEDI, with many thanks to all involved and who journeyed along. 

Hell Flower 

Memories of Sustainable Futures

A publication as part of the "Knots of Ecphore" exhibition first shown at O–Overgaden in 2022. 

Small excerpts from micro-phenomenological interviews with the dancers, glassblower and the artist herself

, Professor of Interdisciplinary Data Collaborations, Professor of Science & Technology Studies and Anthropology, UC Davis

A publication as part of the "Museum for Fremtiden / Museum of the Future" exhibition shown at Teater Sort/Hvid and Kunsthal Aarhus in 2022.  


Udstilling som forestilling, forestilling som udstiling


P(l)ACE OF P(I)ACES

BEARING

Long Road Ahead

Carte de ContinuOnus

Future ContinuOnus

Knots of Ecphore

AabenraaOrgan

Ode to Creode

Selva of Selves (S.O.S)

Ars Memoria – Memes for Imagination

Whether We Are

Head On My Dear

Hell Flower

Memories of the Invisible

Memories of Sustainable Futures

Knots of Ecphore

Museum for Fremtiden / Museum for the Future

Ars Memoria / Memes for Imagination