Kirsten Dufour, Mobile Kultur Byrå, 2006-2011
Kirsten Dufour
with Hilde Methi & Ulrike Solbrig

Mobile Kultur Byrå

Kirsten Dufour’s (*1941, Denmark) practice is rooted in collective processes informed by crossovers of art and activism. As a member of the 1960s Danish art collective Kanonklubben, she has worked closely with her Partner Finn Thybo Andersen on art infused processes that they hope would better the world. After moving into the countryside, they initiated the group TTAL (Clothes for Africa Association Løgstør, 1975-88). Back in Copenhagen, they became founding members of YNKB, Ydre Nørrebro Kultur Bureau (Outer Nørrebro Culture Office) that instigates community- based work such as The Studio of Astrid Noack (2009-10, based around this Danish communist sculptor, 1888-1954) or Weeds (2008-09, based on use of plants in the city). In 2002, she started together with German artist Andrea Creutz an interna- tionally networked archive of Feminist art called Let Us Speak Now.

YNKB website: ynkb.dk

Mobile Kultur Byrå (Mobile Culture Office) is a long-term project by Kirsten Dufour with Kirkenes-based curator Hilde Methi and artist Ulrike Solbrig from Berlin. The performance aims at direct political and social effect: Since 2006, Mobile Kultur Byrå has been working with Russian Market traders, who travel once a month from Murmansk in Russia to the Norwegian town Kirkenes. The difficult working conditions of the mostly female traders were the starting point for interventions – the provision of a translation service, breakfast meetings or a ‘discursive picnic’ – and investigations in relation to the small scale, cross-border trading realities, with the intention to increase awareness and interaction between all the parties involved. Besides documenting the interventions, this video largely contains interviews with traders, local politicians and project participants.


Courtesy Kirsten Dufour

Document media
video

Issue date
2006-2011

Relations
KAN 1

Tags
labour, activism