4.48 Dysphoria examines the pathologization of gender nonconformity and the intersections between mental illness and queerness. The piece, which is made specifically for this exhibition, is a video response to a play by Sarah Kane titled ‘4.48 Psychosis’ (ca. 1999). In the piece, Noah Holtegaard speaks directly to the deceased Kane as a way of articulating conditions that stretch across time and space. Inspired by the format of ‘4.48 Psychosis’, the video piece is divided into non-linear sequences that can be accessed in a random order. The piece is both shown as one video and as a string of one to two minute clips. 4.48 Dysphoria is accessed through QR-codes on posters and stickers along the routes that many trans people take in Aalborg, mapped through focus groups.
The piece is part of the exhibition In/visible Interventions. This exhibition seeks to intervene in and to consider the in/visibility that trans people experience when moving through Aalborg. Trans people simultaneously experience being invisibilized and overexposed. This complex double-bind has material consequences for our mental health, safety, and access to health care. Aalborg is home to one of Denmark’s three gender identity clinics. This clinic has a reputation for being more “progressive” than its counterparts in Copenhagen and Odense. Therefore, Aalborg has, combined with its shorter wait times, gained a particular and peculiar status as the unofficial transmedical capital of Denmark.
The project is part of the platform lím collective's exhibition programme which focuses on artistic practices and forms of self-organising through collaborations between artists and communities in contexts of health- and social care.
The exhibition is curated by Elias Ståhl and is made possible with kind support of IVÆRK, the Danish Arts Foundation, and Region Nord Kulturudviklingspuljen.