Iter Subterraneum
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Mira Adoumier, Cecilia Fiona, Robert Gabris, Ingela Ihrman, Wangechi Mutu, Nour Ouayda, Ovartaci, Naomi Rincón-Gallardo, Kaare Ruud, Anicka Yi
“Iter Subterraneum” is a group exhibition inspired by Ludvig Holberg’s novel Niels Klim’s Underground Travels (1741), often cited as the Nordic region’s first science fiction novel. The story follows a man who falls through a hole in the earth beneath Bergen and discovers a society governed by sentient trees. Here, the Enlightenment’s faith in reason and progress is united with fantasy, satire, and speculative thought.
In Holberg’s subterranean universe, the trees possess both morality and rationality. Today, the novel can be read as an early reflection on ecology and utopian thinking, where branching and coexistence challenge humanity’s notion of superiority. The exhibition takes its name from Holberg’s original Latin title for the book and refers to a journey unfolding underground, in spaces often associated with the hidden, the overlooked, and the unconscious.
“Iter Subterraneum” re-reads Holberg’s underground journey with a gaze directed towards the plant world. Here, the sentient trees become an image of other forms of sensing and reasoning—ways of perceiving and organising the world that do not regard the human as a central unit against which everything is measured. The subterranean and utopian landscapes open up as speculative spaces for thinking with nature rather than about it.
In Galleries 1–4, works by ten artists from diverse geographical and linguistic contexts are presented. In various ways, they investigate connections between nature and technology, mythology and science, and the body and material. Several of the artists turn their gaze away from the human and towards life forms, narratives, and experiences that typically reside on the margins. As in Holberg’s book, several of the works contain both a belief in the possibilities of knowledge and a fundamental doubt about humanity’s place in the natural order.
Through sculpture, film, painting, collage, and performance, the artists open up speculative spaces where plants, fungi, insects, and human bodies enter into shifting relationships. The exhibition approaches utopian thinking not as an endpoint but as a movement—a way of orienting oneself in encounters with nature, knowledge, and imagination.
Gallery 5 expands “Iter Subterraneum” with a historical and literary perspective. A selection of historical editions of Niels Klim’s Underground Travels is presented in collaboration with the Special Collections at the University of Bergen Library, ranging from the original Latin edition Nicolai Klimii Iter Subterraneum (1741) to later translations in Danish, Norwegian, and other languages. Together with illustrations, graphic interpretations, and later artistic adaptations, the selection offers insight into how Holberg’s underground journey has continued to be read and carried forward over time.
A short essay accompanies the exhibition as a supplement for those who wish to delve deeper into the literary, historical, and theoretical perspectives that have informed it.
Curated by Silja Leifsdottir.
With support from The Bergesen Foundation og H. Westfal-Larsen og Hustru Anna Westfal-Larsen’s Almennyttige Fond.
Historical presentation in collaboration with the Department for Special Collections at the University Library of Bergen.
Thanks to: Bergen International Film Festival, Borealis — a festival for experimental music, Esther Schipper, LitfestBergen, Museum Ovartaci, Northing, SMK — National Gallery of Denmark, The Department for Special Collections at the University Library of Bergen, Uppsala konstmuseum, Victoria Miro.
