Nordic folklore tells of “utburder”, small ragged ghosts of children who were left in the forest to die. They shout or sing loudly through the forest on late summer evenings. Some sneak into their mothers at night to drink milk as she sleeps. They are strong, and so heavy that they can drag people down to the underworld. “Fersk blå tåke”, a new performance by Mercedes Mühleisen takes these spirits as a starting point for a combined ritual and act of remembering, in a forest grove. In the performance, time is a sphincter which has opened. Everything that has happened in the forest is still here as living remains. The ghosts have returned, not in search of peace, but to stir the quiet.
The legends associated with ghost children have a brutal historical legacy. In the 17th century, Christian V introduced a law that carried the death penalty for women who gave birth in secret or killed newborns, whilst simultaneously criminalizing giving birth outside of marriage. State and church combined to persecute women, place their bodies under extreme controls and encourage a culture of secretive infanticide as last resort. Unfortunately, these attitudes resonate anew today, felt through tightening abortion legislation and returns to archaic attitudes towards women's rights.
"Fersk blå tåke” seeks to evoke voices from the liminal spaces that arise—between the living and the dead, between layers of time, between that which stirs both tenderness and fear; small ghosts with loud voices.
Mercedes is joined by performers Goro Tronsmo and Marie Gurine Askeland and the musician Flora Wiederkehr.
Join us at Krutthusbakken bus stop at 21:00 on August 23, 2025. Look for the blue light.
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Mercedes Mühleisen (b.1983 in Austria) lives in Oslo and graduated from the Oslo Academy of Fine Arts in 2010. She works primarily with video installations and performance. Her works are often built around her own texts, which she stages and dramatizes. They reflect an interest in mythology, history and nature. She has shown works at Fotogalleriet, Oslo; Sandefjord Kunstforening, Sandefjord; Royal Albert Memorial Museum, Exeter; Kunsthall Oslo, Oslo; Astrup Fearnley Museet, Oslo and Kunstnernes Hus, Oslo.
Fersk blå tåke is part of the 2025 iteration of the Hannah Ryggen Triennale, a collaborative project between several of Trondheim’s art institutions. Hannah Ryggen Triennale is initiated by Nordenfjeldske Kunstindustrimuseum. Partners: Dropsfabrikken, Kjøpmannsgata Ung Kunst (K-U-K), Kunsthall Trondheim, Trondheim kunstmuseum, Trøndelag senter for samtidskunst, and Ørland/Bjugn Kunstforening.