Light Echoes
It can be a challenge for researchers to create broad understanding of their discoveries, and this is where art can play an important role in communicating and visualizing them.
In this exhibition, artists, curators, and astrophysicists explore how the relationship between light and time influences cosmic phenomena such as the expansion of the universe, the observation of distant galaxies, the explosion of massive stars, and the gravitational lensing effect — through four installations and a soundscape.
The title of the exhibition refers to the astronomical phenomenon known as a light echo, in which light from a distant stellar explosion, initially scattered in all directions, is later reflected by interstellar dust at another time and place. This reflection of the original light wave is perceived from Earth as a mirror image of the past. At the same time, the light echo serves as a metaphor for the artists’ work and for the boundless potential of collaboration across disciplines. By reflecting scientific discoveries through artistic expression, new ways of seeing and understanding the universe emerge.
The exhibition has been created and developed in close collaboration with the newly established ArtScience Program at the Niels Bohr Institute by Irene Campolmi, Head of the ArtScience Program.
Refractions of Ice
In “Refractions of Ice”, art and science meet in a visual exploration of the deep ice.
Under polarized light, the crystals of the ice emerge in surprising patterns, where the ice’s own poetic language—of colors, shapes, and movements—reveals traces of past climates and hints at transformations yet to come.
The exhibition presents macro-optical film recordings of ice crystals from millennia-old ice cores, extracted from three kilometers deep within the Greenland ice sheet. Through a scientific and visual study of the ice crystals’ microscopic movements and melting processes, the work invites the viewer into the deep narratives of the ice, where vibrant crystals become images of the planet’s mutability.
Video and sound translate ice-core research into a sensory experience, where the encounter between science and aesthetics creates a visual space for reflection on nature’s transformations and humanity’s place within them—in a time of climatic and existential shifts.
The work was created by Visual Science Studio in collaboration with researchers from the Centre for Ice and Climate at the Niels Bohr Institute, University of Copenhagen.
AFTERGLOW. Conversations on Light
What connects art and astrophysics? Meet eight artists who, in dialogue with astrophysicists, explore the phenomenon of light.
Both art and astronomy share a fascination with the speculative and the mysterious — and with the sense that behind the fog lies a clarity that reveals itself in fleeting glimpses. Science tests and confirms hypotheses, while art examines the world through sensory experiences that evoke reflection. Together, they can help us see the world in a new light and create new narratives about reality.
The exhibition invites you into a space where art gives form to astrophysical phenomena. Here you can experience works that are both visually captivating and thought-provoking — a meeting between scientific facts and aesthetic explorations of light, time, and cosmic spirituality.
The exhibition is created by the curatorial collective Perelin, Nattens Skov, founded by Veronica Rigét and Biba Fibiger.
Ad Lucem
“Lightyear 2026” opens with “Ad Lucem” (To the Light) – an artistic and scientific collaboration between artist Cecilia Ömalm and professor of astronomy Göran Östlin – a project that beautifully unites art and science in an exploration of how light from distant galaxies connects us across time and space.
Experience captivating, deep-blue photographic works created with cyanotype – a unique technique invented by astronomer John Herschel, where iron salts mixed to result in UV-sensitive solutions, and sunlight combine to form images in characteristic shades of blue.
Ömalm and Östlin recreate the light of the Universe using both historical glass plate negatives and modern digital image sensors. Each work is hand-printed, and when sunlight develops these celestial images, it becomes a poetic act – a rebirth of light from the same sky the telescopes once pointed toward.
“Ad Lucem” at the Round Tower marks the duo’s largest solo exhibition to date, featuring 40 works – including a new piece inspired by Ole Rømer’s groundbreaking measurements of the speed of light – presented in a design that mirrors the tower’s shape and evokes the atmosphere of an observatory.
The Shadow Archive
In the exhibition, the Round Tower’s Library Hall is staged as nine individual narratives, inviting visitors to create their own stories about the forgotten, the unforeseen, and the shadowless.
With political, astrophysical and universal issues as an artistic starting point, the exhibition seeks to shed light on what is yet to be told—and thus, yet to be archived.
The exhibition is curated by Marie Bancks, Stine Ljungdalh and Tomas Lagermand Lundme.
Participating artists: Al Masson, Barbara Amalie Skovmand Thomsen, Honey Biba Beckerlee, Marie Bancks, Pulsk Ravn, Stine Ljungdalh, Sonja Strange and Tomas Lagermand Lundme.
The exhibition is supported by:
Statens Kunstfond
Al Masson
Clipping Obsession
Barbara Amalie Skovmand Thomsen
The Music of the Spheres
Engineer and artist George Koutsouris is the project’s technical consultant.
The work has been supported by the Danish Composers’ Society, the Danish Arts Foundation, Knud Højgaard’s Foundation, the Danish Visual Arts Council, Art Hub Copenhagen and the Danish Art Workshops.
Honey Biba Beckerlee
Matters of Time
Marie Bancks
Grain
Pulsk Ravn
The Shadow Work
Stine Ljungdalh
Sofie – The Collective Navigator
Sonja Strange
Panspermia – from Moon Europa with Love
Tomas Lagermand Lundme
Killing the darkness with words
Crystalline Memories of Deep Time
What are the oldest materials we know of? With a palette of crystallized sulfur, enzymes, and meteorites, the exhibition explores the time before Earth’s formation and traces the earliest signs of life.
The journey begins before the solar system formed, when stardust from dying stars clumped together, later falling to Earth as meteorites. Crystalline Memories of Deep Time examines various meteorites and components from the primordial soup’s biochemical processes. Materials like sulfur, enzymes, and amino acids are transformed into images and presented on custom-built screens. The exhibition also delves into LUCA (Last Universal Common Ancestor)—the concept of a single-celled organism as the last common ancestor—through 3-billion-year-old fossilized structures that testify to the earliest stages of life and the interconnectedness of all living things through deep time.
Claus Spangsberg creates captivating works at the intersection of art and science. In recent years, he has specialized in microscopy and crystallization, producing images with chemical substances, DNA, and amino acids.
The exhibition is supported by
Grosserer L.F. Foghts Fond
Den Hielmstierne-Rosencroneske Stiftelse
Knud Højgaards Fond
Poul Johansen Fonden
Lizzi og Mogens Staal Fonden
OVODAN BIOTECH
Københavns Kommune – Rådet for Visuel Kunst
TIME*SOIL*STAR
Eight contemporary artists explore the climate crisis through everything from objects found in areas of Copenhagen, subterranean creatures and floral metaphors to a café in outer space, invasions from distant galaxies.
We belong to the world. The world does not belong to us. This is the starting point for the exhibition TIME*SOIL*STAR, which revolves around humanity’s impact on the planet.
The exhibition stems from what is currently shaking the ground beneath our feet – the global climate crisis and the future we are facing. The artists aim to contribute to a new perception of the world, based on an equality between and respect for all living things on the planet.
The relationship between humans and the planet is the common thread in TIME*SOIL*STAR, but the works range widely – from paintings and sculptures to installations and video, from dystopian sci-fi to botany and contemporary archaeology.
You enter the exhibition by quite literally stepping on delicate drawings of endangered insects. Later, you encounter earth beings from the underground and experience how the past shapes the near future through objects found at Amager Fælled in Copenhagen. You can explore the colonial history of botany and study the metaphors of flowers. From the familiar, the exhibition expands into wild narratives, including an invasion from distant galaxies and future memories from a café in outer space.
The exhibition takes you on a dizzying journey through both biological and historical time, connecting to the Round Tower’s long history as an astronomical observatory and a window to the mysteries of the universe.
Participating artists: Jeanette Land Schou, Nina Maria Kleivan, Karen Gabel Madsen, Bodil Brems, Henriette C. Hansen, Vicky Steptoe, Pernelle Maegaard og Nanna Gro Henningsen.
The exhibition is supported by
Statens Kunstfond
Rådet for Visuel Kunst, Københavns Kommune
Knud Højgaards Fond
The Lost Runestones
Nine contemporary artists interpret the nine runestones that were lost in the Great Fire of Copenhagen in 1728.
In the mid-1600s, King Frederik III ordered runestones to be brought from across all of Denmark at the request of the antiquarian Ole Worm. The runestones, Denmark’s oldest form of literature, were to be gathered at the foot of the Round Tower—perhaps to keep them close to the books in the University Library housed in the Round Tower’s Library Hall. About 12 runestones reached the capital, but nine of them were lost in the Great Fire of Copenhagen in 1728. What stories vanished with those stones? What narratives and perspectives deserve to be heard in our contemporary era?
Now, nine contemporary artists bring the lost runestones back to life, each interpreting one of the nine runestones as a new artwork. Through their individual artistic practices, they give the stones a new voice and a place in the present, recontextualizing them as important testimonies.
“The Lost Runestones” presents a unique intersection of contemporary art, research, and cultural history. Symbolically, the stones return to the Round Tower as originally envisioned in the mid-1600s, when they are exhibited in the Library Hall.
Experience new works by
Frida Retz
The Hjermind Stone II // Creature in My Belly
Is motherhood a machine? What society views as mass-produced merchandise is, to a mother, a legacy of culture. Frida and Tófa are united across millennia in a timeless bond. Motherhood.
Listen to the complete story of the Hjermind Stone II and the work her.
Camilla Brogaard
The Gummarp Stone // ALMOST, THE WEST, GROWTH, THE REST
A stone at the end of a word. A final weight that pulls the words to the ground.
Stones have turned into potatoes, and comfort leaves its mark.
What marks are left in you?
Listen to the complete story of the Gummarp Stone and the work her.
Georg Jagunov
The Ålebæk Stone // The Wild Runes
The runes we humans have neither carved nor can comprehend are the wild runes.
The stones have been here for ages, silent witnesses to the passage of time. Perhaps they guard the universe’s forgotten language?
Listen to the complete story of the Ålebæk Stone and the work her.
Louis André Jørgensen
The Aunslev Stone // The Stone Mist
Have the runes on the Aunslev Stone been carved anew — born from a stone mist that drifted with the clouds and settled in a birch tree? As hidden signs and branching patterns that continue to grow within the trees.
Listen to the complete story of the Aunslev Stone and the work her.
Ida Kvetny
The Landerupense Stone II
How can a stone suddenly transform into a runestone? Did King Christian IV attempt to inscribe himself into the history books? Perhaps the stones hold the answer, speaking to one another in a secret language we have yet to understand.
Listen to the complete story of the Landerupense Stone II and the work her.
Kristoffer Ørum
The Lee Stone // The Good, the Lost, and the Beautiful
Can lost cultural heritage be 3D printed? Can reality be distorted to the point where fact and fiction are indistinguishable?
The stone has returned as an avatar — and it has brought postcards from the Viking Age.
But the Vikings didn’t live like that… did they?
Listen to the complete story of the Lee Stone and the work her.
Sidsel Bonde
The Langå Stone I // Borne off, Bygone, Bound
What happens when a stone is taken out of its context—removed from its landscape? When it shifts from being connected to nature to being relocated and losing its ties. Is it a burial or a homecoming?
Listen to the complete story of the Vamdrup Stone I and the work her.
Olivia Rode Hvass
The Vamdrup Stone I // Path of Desire (Here lies Ebbi’s son)
Why is Ebbi’s son unnamed? Was he not what his family hoped for? He lost his gravestone. Perhaps he still longs to be far away. Is he lying now among kindred spirits?
Listen to the complete story of the Vamdrup Stone I and the work her.
Louise Vind Nielsen
The Torup Stone // Big Cow
What happens when warmth meets cold? Is that where the cosmos begins? Life itself? How can a refrigerator be the modern guardian of the Torup Stone? A humming primal mother? Can you smell the milk of Audhumla?
Listen to the complete story of the Torup Stone and the work her.
Behind the exhibition is the curatorial group Kaellingstenen, consisting of Ida Hørlyck, Nina Fjordbak Nielsen, and Emma Raun. The group works with contemporary art in a space where nature, culture, and experimental media converge. Their curatorial practice often revolves around ancient folklore and the speculative. Kaellingstenen’s mission is to create innovative and accessible art experiences and exhibitions that give voice to what has been forgotten or lost, transcending time and space.
The exhibition is supported by
Københavns Kommune – Rådet for Visuel Kunst
Københavns Kommune – Kultur- og Fritidsudvalgets disponible midler – Støtte til kulturelle aktiviteter.
Ny Carlsbergfondet
5. Juni Fonden
Knud Højgaard Fonden
A.P. Møller Fonden
Lizzie og Mogens Staal Fonden
William Demant Fonden
Gangstedfonden
The exhibition is accompanied by an event program featuring, among other things, talks and workshops.
- June 20/ 5 p.m.
TOWER TALK: What can art tell us about history? (in Danish)
Read more and buy your ticket - June 21 / 12-4 p.m. (drop-in)
WORKSHOP: Make your own runestone
Read more and buy your ticket - 19. July / 12-4 p.m. (drop-in)
WORKSHOP: Make your own runestone
Read more and buy your ticket - August 3 / 12-4 p.m. (drop-in)
WORKSHOP: Make your own runestone
Read more and buy your ticket - August 17 / 12-4 p.m. (drop-in)
WORKSHOP: Make your own runestone
Read more and buy your ticket
Listen to the stories of the runestones
Exhibition with Astrophotographer Jakob Arthur Andersen
Embark on a journey thousands of light-years into space as one of Denmark’s best astrophotographers presents his spectacular images in the Library Hall. Experience Jakob Arthur Andersen’s fascinating shots of the night sky and deep space – the Universe like you’ve never seen it before.
With a telescope and camera, Jakob Arthur Andersen has spent countless hours capturing our fantastic Universe, Solar System, and the landscapes of the night. The exhibition in the Library Hall showcases his finest images – from the Milky Way to distant galaxies.
Jakob Arthur Andersen’s works are a central part of the Round Tower’s astro festival “COSMOS”, which also features scientific talks, astronomy for children, and other stellar experiences – all with the cosmos in focus.
Science Meets Art
Astrophotography demands patience and precision. The process relies not only on technical skill but also on the clarity of the sky and the whims of the weather. Denmark’s climate often poses a challenge, which means that photos are frequently created over multiple nights. When the weather is favorable, you must act quickly—sometimes conditions are optimal for only a few hours at a time. On other nights, the sky can be cloudless and starry all night long.
Jakob’s images require long exposure times and are composed of many individual shots that enhance each other. He views digital editing as his palette and the camera as his brush—astrophotography, to him, is a unique fusion of science and art.
Place your bid
All the works in the exhibition are for sale, but as something special, you can bid on the five largest photographs, with the full amount going directly to Folkekirkens Nødhjælp (DanChurchAid). The auction is already underway and runs until March 21, when the exhibition’s finissage will take place.
Bids are anonymous and must be sent directly via message to Jakob Arthur Andersen on his Instagram account, @clearskyastrofoto.
At the finissage on March 21 from 4–7 PM, it will be possible to continue bidding, after which the winners of the five photographs will be announced. The highest bids secure the artworks.
The sale of other works takes place by contacting Jakob Arthur Andersen via email.
About Jakob Arthur Andersen
Astrophotographer and lecturer Jakob Arthur Andersen opens a window to infinity with his telescope and camera—a visual time machine reaching deep into the vast cosmos.
Jakob is a self-taught astrophotographer and internationally recognized; he has won several awards, including first place in the prestigious International Photography Awards for two consecutive years.
When he’s not observing the universe from his backyard on the island of Falster, he wanders through the quiet nighttime landscapes with his camera and tripod, always in search of new subjects under the night sky that stretches majestically over the dark Danish plains.
This event is part of the program for the Round Tower’s astro festival “COSMOS”.
Tower Talk: Meet Artists Christoph & Sebastian Mügge
Meet the German-Swedish artist duo behind the current exhibition “Lost Library Legends” in the Library Hall.
“Lost Library Legends” blurs the lines between truth and fiction as the artists humorously tackle themes such as our physical and digital remains, death and value systems or how storytelling and factual truths can be distorted.
Join the artist talk to hear the thoughts behind the exhibition and their distinct style as Christoph and Sebastian Mügge show around the site-specific installation on the opening.
The conversation takes place in English and is moderated by the Round Tower’s Head of History and Dissemination, Rasmus Agertoft.
About the artists
The brothers Christoph (b. 1983) and Sebastian Mügge (b. 1981) were born in Germany, but currently live in Sweden.
They are both trained visual artists and have collaborated as an artist duo since 2017. They often exhibit internationally – previous exhibition spaces include galleries and other art venues in the Faroe Islands, England, Greece, Austria and the Netherlands.
As a duo, they create large-scale site-specific projects based on a combination of found materials and their own styles and techniques, e.g. painting, drawing, installation and digital works. In a humorous way, their installations take on existential themes such as life, death, what we value and our physical and digital footprint on the world, and how factual truths and storytelling can be distorted.
“Lost Library Legends” takes place in the Library Hall from 22 June to 11 August.
Read more about the exhibition here.