Photo: Slow Bee Studio
“Our house is on fire. I’m here to say, our house is on fire.”
OUR HOUSE IS ON FIRE is an installation artwork based on the famous words of climate activist Greta Thunberg at the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting in Davos in January 2019.
The artwork is intensely focused on the ongoing climate emergency. The minimalist construction outlining the shape of a house is built almost entirely by recycled materials from previous SIIKU artworks. Animated LED lights create the illusion of a flaming fire in interaction with the circular reflection pool placed at the center of the house on fire.
The artwork debuted in September 2021 as a combined installation and sound artwork created by SIIKU and author/poet Silja E.K. Henderson, and was presented in collaboration with art center Kunstforeningen GL STRAND. On show in front of the art center in central Copenhagen, the exhibition opening featured speeches by the artists as well as representatives of environmental NGOs NOAH and Fridays For Future DK. The exhibition finissage featured a ceremony and performance by artist-activist Ida Dalsgaard Nicolaisen.
The realisation of the this initial edition was created by SIIKU and Silja E. K. Henderson with support from Slots- og Kulturstyrelsen and Rådet for Visuel Kunst in collaboration with Klimastrejke – Fridaysforfuture Denmark, NOAH, and Kunstforeningen GL STRAND.
SILJA E. K. HENDERSON (b. 1981) is an author and a poet with a background in disaster psychology. Among other things, she has published the hybrid poetry work 1.7 Tipping Point in 2018. SIIKU and Henderson have collaborated on several occasions, including SIIKU’s solo exhibition, Meltage (The Act, Result and Amount) in 2019.
Silja E. K. Henderson created the poem ”Hvor går vi hen” and the soundscape “Our House Is On Fire” for the first edition of OUR HOUSE IS ON FIRE.
In the summer of 2022, OUR HOUSE IS ON FIRE was presented for Folkemødet in Bornholm, June 16-19 and Ungdommens Folkemøde in Copenhagen, September 7-8 2022 – this time as an installation and co-creation artwork inviting participants to create colorful protest banners for the installation.
