KW Institute for Contemporary Art is a place in Berlin where artists, institutions, and people come together to share ideas, discuss social and political issues, and experience art. We have exhibition halls, apartments, offices, event spaces, and a café, and work with partners around the world.

Arctic Hysteria is the first solo exhibition of the artist Pia Arke outside Kalaallit Nunaat (Greenland) and the Nordic countries. KW organized the exhibition together with John Hansard Gallery, Southampton (UK).

Pia Arke lived from 1958 to 2007. She was the daughter of a Greenlandic mother and a Danish father. Her work looks at memories, time and places as well as her own story.

Pia Arke said her work is about the silence that surrounds the connection between Greenland and Denmark. In 1721, Denmark declared Greenland to be part of Denmark. Greenland has had its own government since 2009, but is still not independent of Denmark. This power imbalance still makes the conversation between the two countries difficult. Pia Arke said she was born into the silence between Greenland and Denmark.

Pia Arke takes on different roles in her art. She is an artist, researcher and ethnographer. She looks at the history of Greenland as well as her own family history. She always brought the conversation back to the power imbalance and colonial history between the two countries. Pia Arke looked at the discussions from a feminist point of view.

The title of the exhibition is Arctic Hysteria. Pia Arke also gave this name to an important series of her work. Arctic Hysteria looks at how Pia Arke used her body in her art to make people think. The Arctic is the area around the North Pole. The exhibition shows many works by Pia Arke: sculptures, photos, performances, texts and works on paper.

In her works, she puts places and things together in a new way. So, she tries to write her own story, in which she both felt a sense of belonging and could question herself.

A new book is published together with the exhibition.

– Pia Arke positions herself in a so-called ‘third-place’: a place between two or more identities. How do you understand the term third-place? Is it a place, a feeling, or perhaps an attitude?

2. – Pia Arke uses maps, photographs, and archives in her work. Who produces these forms of documentation, and how do they shape our thinking about the world?

3. – What do you know about the history of the countries Denmark and Kalaallit Nunaat (Greenland), and the relationship between the two?

4. – What topic are you particularly interested in, and how would you create an archive about it?