Vitlycke-CPA joins a brand new, and quite atypical, Nordic-itinerant-artistic residency focusing on artistic research, low-carbon travel and cultural exchange.
Septentrionales is organised by the Institut francais de Suède, in partnership with the Instituts français of Denmark, Norway and Finland + local partners in each of the countries.
Septentrionales is kind of a “slow-motion residency”. It will offer a French artist to develop an artistic research while travelling by train, bus or boat only, during two months (15 August – 15 October 2024), from southern Denmark to Norway via the Swedish west coast, then up to Narvik and across Lapland to Rovaniemi before traveling down to Helsinki, then Stockholm, then Malmö, and then back to Copenhagen (see attached map). The idea is to consider time and space as material.

This two-month travelling residency is open to one artist selected each year on the basis of a call for projects, with no discipline restrictions. The artist will get to grips with different environmental, ecological and sociological realities by spending a few days in a variety of already-identified locations and partners. The Institut francais covers the artist’s fees, travel, and daily expenses, and coordinate the whole residency. But we also involve, in each of the countries, local partners to accompany the artist on site and organise a programme of visits and meetings with local personalities and artists.

The call for application was launched in January and received more than 120 projects.
In the end, it was unanimously selected Ingrid Buffetaut as Septentrionales’ first laureate.