PUBLIC RETREAT ... through the eye of the ear. Click, stop, ) ) ) ) !? 





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Immersive Sound Experience / Practice-based Research / Text / Workshops

Solo exhibition at Galleria Oksasenkatu 11, Helsinki, Finland.

Click. Click. Click. Stop.
The room shrinks.
Echoes.
What does this city sound like inside your head?
How would you draw it? Imagine, conceptualize and feel and dream and nightmare it?

Without even trying, we build whole worlds from spatial auditory memories.
Each of us follow our own internal maps, subconsciously herded by urban sonic markers. Ding ding ding....
broooom broooom broom, beep, whirr, ta ta ta ta
*reverberant mumble of restaurant hall, shopping mall, train station*
*constant backdrop of motorized traffic*
*light bright vocalization of wind*


PUBLIC RETREAT ...through the eye of the ear. click, stop, ) ) ) ) !? is an immersive sound experience about how we sense the world with our ears.





...through the eye of the ear. Click, stop, ) ) ) ) !?
Multichannel sound installation and experience, approx. 30 min, loop.






Silent ) ) ) ) Poem 
Spatial textile installation and animation. approx. 5 min loop. 




Oscillating inbetween mediums
Digital print 841 x 1188 mm





The Graveyard Digression - radio edit
Spatial sound installation, approx. 30 min, loop



Rest In Public
Digital print 841 x 1188 mm





Reclining ear
Digital print 1188 x 841 mm




Can you hear it?
Digital print 1188 x 841 mm





Acoustic Entanglements (Sea of Sound) 
Digital print 841 x 1188 mm




Vastness and Open Vistas
Digital print 841 x 1188 mm






Public Work Station, workshop and installation views






PUBLIC RETREAT is an interdisciplinary art project exploring our (human and more-than-human) common auditory urban environments.

Through artistic research, sound works, radio broadcasts, workshops and exhibitions, our aim is to engage fellow citizens to contemplate on the role of sounds in our lives, from their purely physical properties to their emotional, psychological and physiological impact.

Earlier projects include semi-utopian architectural plans for an entire new neighborhood; an absurd elevator pitch for an inverted skyscraper – a subterranean earthscraper – that could fit all of mankind; a sound walk about graveyards; handsewn site specic and locally distributed magazines; and a radio show about city planning, voiced in part by an enthusiastic bird.

PUBLIC RETREAT is:
Jo Mikkel Sjaastad Huse (b. 1991, NO), visual artist and writer working primarily within the fields of text, installation, performance and sound. Huse has education from art academies in Oslo, Bergen, Tromsø and Stockholm. Huse stages objects and creatures, and lets them speak on his behalf about work and leisure, and the position of the animal in a human centered world. Recently exhibited in Palmera (NO), and Hjorten Sculpture Park (SE). Upcoming exhibitions in Oplandia Center for Contemporary Art in Lillehammer and BO, Oslo.

Nicole Cecilie Bitsch Pedersen (b. 1990, DK), composer, visual-, and sound artist exploring the interweaved relationship between nature, sound, and technology. Pedersen holds a Master's degree in composition from the Danish Institute of Electronic Music (DIEM) and a postmaster in public art from OPI Lab at Royal Institute of Art in Stockholm, Sweden. She has recently exhibited at Skovhuset (DK), SPARK (SE), Nordic Music Days (FO), and received grants from the Danish Arts Foundation and Danish Composers’ Society.

Johanna Fager (b. 1982, SE), architect and artist working with public art, spatial installations and complex architectural projects. Her focus is often on the human experience of space(s) and their sequences, materiality, sound and the political context. She is educated at KTH School of Architecture, Royal Institute of Art (SE), the Royal Institute of Art (SE) and Academy of Art Architecture and Design (CZ). Currently working on a site specic public artwork for Svenska Margaretakyrkan Oslo (NO) as a member of the platform Of Public Interest (OPI). She recently received a research grant from Royal Institute of Art (SE).

Future works include 12 sound pieces for radio on radiOrakel (NO). Residencies at Sound Art Lab, Struer (DK) and participation in a symposium on sound and listening. Listening events, sound/radio Radio Sydväst Stockholm (SE) and more.

PUBLIC RETREAT is generously supported by Nordic Culture Fund, Nordic Culture Point, OCA (Office for Contemporary Art, Norway), The Swedish Arts Grants Committee, Danish Composers Society, Danish Arts Council, OPI Lab and Sound Art Lab, Struer.

Collaborators and conversation partners to PUBLIC RETREAT; Prof. Ville Pulkkii Aalto University, Sound Art Lab Struer, Of Public Interest (OPI), Radio Sydväst, Lars Lengberg, Lähiradio, IDA radio, Maria Morberg, Per Hedfors, radiOrakel, Platform Stockholm.


All images and drawings ©Nicole Cecilie Bitsch Pedersen, Jo Mikkel Sjaastad Huse, Johanna Fager when not stated otherwise.












©Johanna Fager 2025. All rights reserved
e-mail: johanna@johannafager.se, instagram: @johanna_fager