Hugarflug 2025 - Unstable Systems by Sigmundur Pall Freysteinsson

Unstable Systems Instability can be a creative force in art, design, and architecture. Artists, designers, and scholars work both with and against systems that are ever-changing, fragile, or unpredictable. Whether dealing with technological systems, ecosystems, social structures, or sensory experiences, instability is often a prerequisite for creation. Instability opens pathways for new ideas and processes, reshaping how we approach and redesign the systems that shape our lives. It can also refer to the creative act itself—one that does not follow predetermined trajectories or established norms. Art, design, and architecture serve as tools to disrupt stable systems and/or shed new light on systems that appear stable but in reality, they are not. No system is truly stable, and when we resist that instability, it becomes a problem. Instability is perhaps the only certainty we can rely on. Hugarflug 2025, the annual conference on artistic research, will take place on September 11–12. It will serve as a platform for research that engages with instability across various systems—from technological advancements such as AI and interactive systems to issues related to politics, society, and the environment. We will explore how instability functions as a tool for generating new possibilities while also fueling unrest and transformation within society and academia. The Iceland University of the Arts invites proposals of all kinds, including presentations of ongoing or completed research by our faculty, students, and collaborators.

Friday, 12. september, 2025 - 9:30 - 10:20

Room:

Hugarflug annual conference on artistic research

11. - 12. September 2025

Iceland University of the Arts

Keynote by Ellen Johanne Røed

Ellen Johanne Røed

Ellen Johanne Røed

Rector, Stockholm University of the Arts

Ellen Johanne Røed is a professor in Film and Media and leads the research project Image as Site, based in the Subject Area of Film and Media at the Stockholm University of the Arts, and funded by the Swedish Research Council. Her artistic research centers on the moving image and unfolds across a range of artistic disciplines—including visual arts, music, theatre, film, dance, and media art—often through interdisciplinary collaborations. As a result, her work is both deeply rooted in specific disciplines and inherently cross-disciplinary.

Ethical concerns in artistic research have long been central to her practice. Together with Rebecca Hilton, she explored these issues in the research project Together Forever: Artistic Research, Documentation, and Ethics, which they presented at the ELIA Biennial in 2023. Ellen Johanne Røed serves on the steering group of VIS – Nordic Journal for Artistic Research, which she helped initiate, as well as the strategic council of the KK Foundation and ELIA’s working group for Artistic Research.

Since 1995, Ellen Johanne Røed has been active in the field of art, and since 2004 in artistic education and research. In 2016, she joined Stockholm University of the Arts as a profile professor responsible for the area Art, Technology and Materiality, and led the doctoral programme until 2022. Previously, she served on the board of the Norwegian Artistic Research Programme, where she contributed to the establishment of a national interdisciplinary research school, strategic development initiatives, and funding of artistic research. She has also played a key role in organizing the Nordic Summer School for Artistic Research (SAAR) and served on the Swedish Ethical Review Board from 2020 to 2022.

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