🏗️ We’re ready… are you?
After months of preparation and building, it’s finally time: the Noorderlicht Biennale 2025 is kicking off!

Machine Entanglements opens this weekend at six unique locations. Featuring work by over 70 artists and makers from around the world, we explore the entanglement of technology, ecology, and society.

📍 Check out all locations & events on our website #linkinbio

See you there!

#NoorderlichtBiennale2025 #MachineEntanglements #kunst #fotografie #expo2025 #ecologie #technologie #samenleving #groningen #friesland #drenthe #ai #artandtech #biennale

🎉 Opening Weekend Noorderlicht Biennale – 11 to 13 July 🎉

Next weekend marks the festive opening of the 30th edition of the Noorderlicht Biennale: Machine Entanglements. This anniversary edition unfolds simultaneously across Groningen, Friesland, and Drenthe, showcasing work by over 70 artists from the Netherlands and abroad 🌍

Join us for three days of celebrations, including opening speeches, bus tours, live music, garden lunch, and guided tours through unique exhibition venues.

📅 Friday 11 July – Opening Museum Belvédère (+ bus trip via Museum Dr8888)
📅 Saturday 12 July – Opening De Proef (+ bus trip, lunch, and guided tour)
📅 Sunday 13 July – Opening Niemeyerfabriek

✨ All openings are free to attend.
A small fee applies for the bus rides and lunch.

👉 More info & registration via #linkinbio or on our website.

#NoorderlichtBiennale2025 #MachineEntanglements #kunst #fotografie #expo2025 #ecologie #technologie #samenleving #groningen #friesland #drenthe #ai #artandtech #biennale

(Image: Noviki, Dream of the Machine, 2024. Courtesy BMW Art Club)

📍 Brouwerij Fortuna during the Noorderlicht Biennial 2025: Machine Entanglements

On Vlieland, where the dunes not only shape the landscape but also sustain life, drinking water is drawn from a hidden freshwater lens beneath the island. In this context, artists present works that make the invisible visible. They focus on processes that usually unfold far beyond our perception: deep beneath volcanoes, in the veins of coal, or in underwater rifts where the Earth reshapes itself.

This part of Machine Entanglements was made possible with the support of Arcadia and Into the Great Wide Open.

Featuring works by: Louis Braddock Clarke, Michael Najjar, Hedwich Rooks

Bonus: Soft Opening on Vlieland
🗓️ Sunday 6 July at 14:00 – Brouwerij Fortuna with live music by Cashmyra
You are also welcome here. No registration needed.

🗓️ On view from 12 July to 7 September 2025
🔗 More info: #linkinbio

#NoorderlichtBiennale2025 #MachineEntanglements #kunst #fotografie #expo2025 #ecologie #technologie #samenleving #groningen #friesland #drenthe #ai #artandtech #biennale

(Image: Louis Braddock Clarke, Silent Sun Splatter, 2025)

📸✨Noorderlicht appoints TWO new junior directors!

From now on, Noorderlicht has two junior directors: Ino (11) and Jep (10)! They were selected following our open call for children who want to help shape the future of art, technology, and Noorderlicht. Ino loves robots and old windmills 🛠️, Jep proudly calls himself probably the best Fortnite player in Groningen 🎮.

Together with our team, they’ll spend the coming year co-deciding, testing, advising, and asking questions. They’ll help come up with new ideas for exhibitions, family days, games, and everything else that can make Noorderlicht even more playful and clever. This way, we ensure Noorderlicht is truly by and for children.

On Sunday 13 July, Ino will officially open the 30th Noorderlicht Biennale Machine Entanglements at the Niemeyerfabriek, together with our new mayor Roelien Kamminga and our director. (Jep will already be on holiday, but he’ll join in later!)

Want to attend? Register via #linkinbio

📸 Jep, Roosje en Ino – selfie 2 juli 2025

#Noorderlicht #Kinderdirecteur #MachineEntanglements #Fotografie #KunstEnTechnologie

📍 Niemeyerfabriek during the Noorderlicht Biennial 2025: Machine Entanglements

Here in the former Niemeyer factory—once a proud symbol of Groningen’s industrial progress—Machine Entanglements also explores the shadow side of technological innovation. In a space steeped in labour and production, artists pose critical questions and activate their imagination: what if technology is not merely a tool for acceleration, control or extraction, but also a chance to repair, reconnect, and unearth forgotten histories?

Featuring works by: Chloe Abidi, Roel Backaert & Niels Schrader, Louis Braddock Clarke, Sara Sejin Chang (Sara van der Heide), Florinda Ciucio, Grayson Cooke, Sounak Das, Beyza Dilem Topdal-İrez, Dawid Dobosz, Bart Eysinks Smeets, Danny Franzreb, Emma Godfrey Pigott, Nicolas Gourault, Heinrich Holtgreve & Moritz Metz, Tashiya De Mel, Jack Latham, Emilia Martin, Michael Najjar, Josèfa Ntjam, Thomas Nolf, Noviki, Hannah O'Flynn, Alice Pallot, Sabrina Ratté, Refrakt, Lena Schabus, Rick Silva, Sondi, Telemagic, Yang Su.

🗓️ On view from 12 July to 7 September 2025
🔗 More info: #linkinbio

#NoorderlichtBiennale2025 #MachineEntanglements #kunst #fotografie #expo2025 #ecologie #technologie #samenleving #groningen #friesland #drenthe #ai #artandtech #biennale

(Image: Noviki, Dream of the Machine, 2024. Courtesy BMW Art Club)

The winner of the Noorderlicht Award 2025 is… 🥁 Viktoria Stefanova!

The graduation project Lost in Two Eras explores what it means to live in the contradiction between fast-paced digital life and our romantic longing for the slow, simple, and analogue past. Through quiet performance and poetic visuals, the work stages a beautifully slow scroll through nostalgia, glitch, and desire.

The jury praised the project for its simple clarity and performative strength. Viktoria receives a €1,000 prize to support the further development and presentation of her work during the Noorderlicht Biennial Machine Entanglements this summer. CONGRATULATIONS!

An honourable mention goes to Iris van Kalsbeek for The Land Where Animals Kiss — an erotic ecosystem of slow intimacy and fearless sensuality. Go check it out at the Niemeyer factory.

The Academie Minerva and Frank Mohr Institute Graduation Show 2025 is open until 20 June across various locations in Groningen. Don’t miss it!

#NoorderlichtAward #ClassOf2025 #ArtAndTechnology #LensBasedMedia #MachineEntanglements #ViktoriaStefanova #IrisvanKalsbeek

📍 Tschumipaviljoen during the Noorderlicht Biennial 2025: Machine Entanglements

Signals of you is a coproduction by Noorderlicht and Kunstpunt Groningen. Christy Westhovens reveals what is normally invisible: the signals sent out by our devices. The installation is placed inside the glass Tschumi Pavilion and consists of red panels that move when they detect Bluetooth signals from nearby devices. Not just from your smartphone, but also from things like earbuds, smartwatches, or electric bikes. The 79 panels represent the 79 Bluetooth channels used in the radio spectrum—so the busier the area, the more panels start to spin. This makes the flow of digital communication in the space clearly visible.

🗓️ On view from 12 July to 7 September 2025
🔗 More info: #linkinbio

#NoorderlichtBiennale2025 #MachineEntanglements #kunst #fotografie #expo2025 #ecologie #technologie #samenleving #groningen #friesland #drenthe #ai #artandtech #biennale #kunstpuntgroningen #tschumipaviljoen

(Image: Christy Westhovens, Signalen van de stad, 2025)

📍 De Proef during the Noorderlicht Biennial 2025: Machine Entanglements

At De Proef an exhibition unfolds that reveals new relationships between humans, machines, and the landscape. The artists at this location explore how technological systems not only intervene in the world around us, but also become part of living processes: from the growth of a plant to the memory of a landscape, from a cow’s breath to the ripening of a tomato.

What if plants push back against human interventions in nature? What if the animal speaks, the algorithm listens, and the landscape responds?

This part of Machine Entanglements is a coproduction of Noorderlicht & De Proef.

Featuring works by: affect lab, Crystal Bennes, Ioana Cirlig, Umberto Diecinove, Diana Gheorghiu, Heleen Haijtema, Susanne Kriemann, Michael Najjar, Špela Petrič, Polymorf, Livia Ribichini, Nina van Tuikwerd, Henk Wildschut, Lorenzo Zerbini.

🗓️ On view from 12 July to 7 September 2025
🔗 More info: #linkinbio

#NoorderlichtBiennale2025 #MachineEntanglements #kunst #fotografie #expo2025 #ecologie #technologie #samenleving #groningen #friesland #drenthe #ai #artandtech #biennale #deproef

(Image: Henk Wildschut, Territorium, 2024)

📍 Museum Dr8888 as a location of the Noorderlicht Biennial 2025: Machine Entanglements

In Drachten, a city with a rich history in art and technology, Machine Entanglements explores how technology is fundamentally transforms the way we think, live, and work. How does technology shape our relationship with ourselves? How does it alter the way we perceive, remember, and act?

Artists Noor Boiten, Sophie Gerrard, Hendrik Hantschel, Thomas Kuijpers, Steven Maybury, Livia Ribichini, Sasha Rudensky, Sylvia Sanchez, Sebastian Schmieg, Martine Stig and Katja Stuke present works that reveal the increasingly blurred boundaries between human and machine.

🗓️ On view from 12 July to 7 September 2025
🔗 More info: #linkinbio

#NoorderlichtBiennale2025 #MachineEntanglements #kunst #fotografie #expo2025 #ecologie #technologie #erfgoed #groningen #friesland #drenthe #ai #artandtech #biennale #museumdr8888

(Image: Hendrik Hantschel, A Whole New World, video, 2025)

📣 We proudly present the artists of the Noorderlicht Biennial 2025: Machine Entanglements!

From speculative futures to digital landscapes and technocropping — this edition features work by more than 70 artists from the Netherlands and abroad who explore the entangled relationship between technology, ecology, and heritage.

📍 de Niemeyer Factory, Kunstpunt (het Tschumipaviljoen), Museum Dr8888, Museum Belvédère, Brouwerij Fortuna, and De Proef
📅 Opening: July 11, 12 and 13
⏳ On view until September 7

Featuring works by: affect lab, Chloe Abidi, Clint Baclawski, Crystal Bennes, Noor Boiten, Louis Braddock Clarke, Sara Sejin Chang (Sara van der Heide), Ioana Cirlig, Florinda Ciucio, Grayson Cooke, Sounak Das, Tashiya De Mel, Umberto Diecinove, Beyza Dilem Topdal-İrez, Dawid Dobosz, Chun Hua Catherine Dong, Bart Eysink Smeets, Danny Franzreb, Sophie Gerrard, Diana Gheorgiou, Emma Godfrey Pigott, Nicolas Gourault, Heleen Haijtema, Hendrik Hantschel, Heinrich Holtgreve & Moritz Metz, Hyeseon Jeong & Seongmin Yuk, Susanne Kriemann, Anouk Kruithof, Thomas Kuijpers, Jack Latham, Emilia Martin, Steven Maybury, Victor Mendez, Christoph Miler, Michael Najjar, Mizuho Nishioka, Thomas Nolf, Noviki, Josefa Ntjam, Hannah O'Flynn, Alice Pallot, Špela Petrič, Polymorf, Sabrina Ratté, Refrakt, Livia Ribichini, misha de ridder, Gjert Rognli, Hedwich Rooks, Sasha Rudensky, Nicolás Rupcich, Sylvia Sanchez, Lena Schabus, Sebastian Schmieg, Niels Schrader & Roel Backaert, Rick Silva, Sondi, Martine Stig, Katja Stuke, Yang Su, Julieta Tarraubella, Telemagic, Stijn Terpstra, Nina van Tuikwerd, Christy Westhovens, Henk Wildschut, Lorenzo Zerbini.

(Photo: Noviki, Dream of the Machine, video still, 2024. Courtesy of BMW Art Club)

#NoorderlichtBiennale2025 #MachineEntanglements #kunst #fotografie #expo2025 #ecologie #technologie #erfgoed #groningen #friesland #drenthe #ai #artandtech #biennale