Liv Bugge, Umbilical Fire, 2025, film still. Two-channel video, color, sound, 10’. Produced for Kunsthall Trondheim. Courtesy of the artist.
How do our energy concepts—from industrial power and heating to electricity, transportation, and production—shape our understanding of eroticism, ancestry, and nature? In Umbilical Fire, Norwegian artist Liv Bugge explores the subtle yet profound connections linking these forces across human and non-human realms. Through new commissions, including film, installation, and prints, joined by previous work on the topic, the artist invites us to reconsider these seemingly separate systems as profoundly intertwined.
As we burn the remains of ancient life for fuel while simultaneously threatening future generations, Bugge examines our historical debt to the past and our moral obligations to the unborn. Drawing from Norway's complex history—from its fishing and nautical traditions to its more recent offshore petroleum wealth—Umbilical Fire questions our relationship with natural resources and reproduction across time, including the act of building national identity.
The exhibition's scenography surrounds the newly commissioned film, immersing visitors in a striking landscape of 3D-printed clay sculptures and drawings made by printing clay onto paper. These sculptures and drawings reveal underwater oil field environments across Norway, literally and metaphorically exposing what lies beneath the surface. Through this combination, Bugge also exposes energy companies' attempts at "greenwashing" and "purplewashing," including naming oil sources after Nordic feminist and folkloric figures.
Umbilical Fire is part of the 2025 edition of the Hannah Ryggen Triennale, a collaborative project across several Trondheim art institutions exploring the topic of “mater”—the Latin word for mother—which connects biological motherhood to our cultural heritage and physical world, reflecting how deeply the maternal is woven into our language through words like “matter,” “material,” and “mother earth.” Mining these subjects, Umbilical Fire features a symbolic nautical rope spun from sheep and dog wool, weaving together narratives of oil as modernity’s “mother’s milk,” Bugge’s personal history of being raised in a family with sled dogs, and the legacy of artist Hannah Ryggen, and her politically engaged tapestries.
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Umbilical Fire is supported by Bergesenstiftelsen, The Fritt Ord Foundation, SpareBank1 SMN Samfunnsutbytte, Sparebankstiftelsen – SMN, Arts and Culture Norway, The Audio and Visual Fund – Fond for lyd og bilde, Norwegian Visual Artists Fund – Billedkunstnernes Vederlagsfond, and Oslo National Academy of the Arts.
The Hannah Ryggen Triennale is initiated by Nordenfjeldske Kunstindustrimuseum. Collaborating institutions are Dropsfabrikken, Kjøpmannsgata Ung Kunst (K-U-K), Kunsthall Trondheim, Trondheim kunstmuseum, Trøndelag senter for samtidskunst, and Ørland/Bjugn Kunstforening.
Umbilical Fire is curated by Adam Kleinman and Katrine Elise Agpalza Pedersen.