Ann Lislegaard: Extinction - The Lost Voices

Take a seat in the old park and enjoy Ann Lislegaard’s sound installation featuring the voices of endangered birds – a work of art that graces the gardens of Nivaagaard this summer.

Ann Lislegaard’s art responds directly to current issues such as climate change and the consequences of technological developments. Her poetic works conjure up new spaces for contemplation and reflection on humanity’s presence and role in the world.

The sound installation Extinction - The Lost Voices (2020/2025) is based on an archive of recordings of the vocal expressions of birds found on the red list of endangered species. The artist has processed and reworked selected bird sounds and their ‘dialects,’ shaping them into a sound collage of different types of calls.

Bird species on the red list are vulnerable, threatened and endangered; their voices may fall silent in nature. In the audio installation, their language is reactivated and emitted from three outdoor speakers, blending with the sounds made by the park’s existing birdlife. In the meeting between nature and the mediated language of the artwork, a new environment or habitat may emerge, one where bird voices from near and far intertwine, connecting past and future.

Extinction - The Lost Voices can be regarded as a portal where a multitude of sounds and impressions unfold, inviting us to be even more aware of how other species communicate.

About Ann Lislegaard

Ann Lislegaard is a visual artist. Having studied fine art in Copenhagen and New York, Lislegaard has exhibited widely in Denmark and internationally. She represented Denmark at the Venice Biennale in 2005. From 2004 to 2013, Lislegaard was a professor at the School of Media Arts at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts in Copenhagen. She was awarded the Eckersberg Medal in 2015 and the Thorvaldsen Medal in 2024.

The exhibition is supported by:

Aage & Johanne | Louis-Hansens Fond and Overretssagfører L. Zeuthens Mindelegat