Chosen Families

🧡 𝐎𝐩𝐞𝐧 𝐎𝐮𝐭 𝐅𝐞𝐬𝐭𝐢𝐯𝐚𝐥 𝟐𝟎𝟐𝟓 - 𝐂𝐇𝐎𝐒𝐄𝐍 𝐅𝐀𝐌𝐈𝐋𝐈𝐄𝐒 🧡

September 13th – 20th
Opening September 13th at 19:00

Full festival programme can be viewed here.

Open Out 2025: Chosen Families!

Open Out is a an annual queer arts festival, a passion driven project, emerging from dreams and needs since 2017. Open Out are dedicated to put forward queer artists and create a sense of community; coming together with a shared responsibility of taking care of the unlimited, the disturbed, the queer, the snails and frogs, the sad angel wings, the tiny and the funny seeds.

Open Out curates a group exhibition, and host workshops, talks, community dinners, performances, guided tours of the exhibition, a famous karaoke night and much more over the course of a week in Tromsø, northern Norway.

Invite your friends, grandparents, pets, crushes, spouses, children, neighbors – Open Out is open for all and completely free.

This year, the festival's theme is Chosen Families.

How do we choose family, and get chosen back? What have we been taught to expect from family, and what do we actually need? To choose to stay, or to choose to walk away. To trust that others will be there. Growing up surrounded by people who didn’t know how to find the words to describe, to explain or understand. Meeting and hearing about the people who tried, who found words, changed words, made new ones, in an attempt to speak the unspeakable.

Where and how do you make your home with those you choose to stay in relation with? Lovers, friends, animals, allies, plants, art, acquaintances, neighbors, many more? Who are the beings that populate your life, and in which living situations are you with them?

Participating artists:

Andrea White Hveding
Arnhild Haagensen / Heila
Beatrice
Bugarin & Castle
Finch
Frida Agerhus Vikström
Grusha Pankert
Jonathan Danzer
Kai Mikkel Balto
Laura Xinyue Zhou
Marianne Johansen
Marie Saure
Maya Acharya
Mayara Baptista
Onur Tayranoğlu
Pia Graf
Stix Omar
Subira Joy & Wandia Nduku
Tarinoita Utopiasta Collectiveand with:
DJ Shabby Chic
DJ grisha223
Lady Die
Good Night Out Campaign and Klubb Tarab
ISKRA Productions
MONDO Books

FESTIVAL PROGRAMME

Saturday 13th

19:00 - Festival Opening
Welcome to the festival! The exhibition opens with food & drinks

20:00 - Lady Die
Show and DJ set

Sunday 14th

13:00 - Guided Tour of the festival exhibition

14:30 - Ring-Making Workshop (part 1)

14:30–17:30 - Workshopping Utopias
Dance Workshop

Monday 15th

14:00–17:00 - Come and Play!
Board game afternoon

16:00 - Ring-Making Workshop (part 2)

16:00 - Queer Sámi Symbols
Silent Path (part 1) talk and discussion

Tuesday 16th

13:00–16:00 - Community Workshop
Harm reduction, conflict & care by GNO

16:00 - Queer Sámi Symbols
Silent Path (part 2) Dream journey & more

18:00–19:00 - How to Subculture
Workshop (part 1)

Wednesday 17th

14:00 - Ring-making workshop (part 3)

19:00 - Open Mic
By ISKRA productions at Small Projects

Thursday 18th

16:00–18:30 - DJ-Workshop
For FLINTAs

19:00 - VOZES
Performance by Mayara Baptista

19:00 - Dinner
For workshop participants

Friday 11th

15:00 - Riso-Printing Workshop
Tending Greif

17:00 - Ring-Making Workshop (Part 4)

19:00 - Joy NDUKU
Performance by Sabira Joy and Wandia Nduku

20:30 - Karaoke Night

Saturday 12th

13:00 - Ring-Making Workshop (Part 5)

15:00 - Guided Tour of the festival exhibition

20:00 - Closing Party
DJ Shabby Chic & DJ grisha223