Every Thursday, a bus departs from Lundtoftegade in Nørrebro, travels through the city, and arrives at Copenhagen Contemporary on Refshaleøen. Our house fills with happy, creative, and energetic children aged 9-13 who come to engage in art here at CC. The Thursday Club is an after-school club for children living in the Lundtoftegade neighborhood, where each week the children create art, talk, play, eat snacks, discuss, and explore our changing exhibitions. The children also help organize their own vernissages at CC, where their creative projects are exhibited for family and friends invited to CC.

The club has its own club room where children are encouraged to unleash their imagination and creativity. At each club session, the children meet the same two regular key persons from CC, along with a fixed housing social worker from Nørrebrobyggerne, who acts as a bridge between CC and the children’s residential area.

CC has developed this leisure offering in collaboration with Nørrebrobyggerne, the housing social effort in Lundtoftegade AKB in Nørrebro, and the exhibition venue Til Vægs. With art at its core, the aim is for children to build new communities and strengthen self-esteem, well-being, and life skills.

Children who complete the club program have the opportunity to become pocket money workers at CC once they reach the age of 13. As pocket money workers, they have a designated contact person from CC who supports them in their first work experience.

Paint rollers on bamboo sticks, balloons and hands as brushes, cardboard boxes, and giant canvases. There are many different ways to participate in art. At CC, we regularly host creative workshops for groups with disabilities, neurodivergence, and support needs. Each workshop is tailored to the specific group participating. Together, we explore selected exhibitions, and afterward, there is time for collaborative creativity, where we paint, draw, and express ourselves using various tools and materials.

In 2024, we have hosted workshops with classes from special schools, Kunstskolen for Voksne udviklingshæmmede, culture house Pulsen, Forening Outsideren, and Brønshøjvej.

Our methods and workshops are inspired by a collaboration with the British artist collective Project Art Works. The collective consists of neurodiverse artists and activists who, for 25 years, have worked with artists with complex support needs, co-creation, and representation through art. In 2024, they are exhibiting Residential at CC. Read more about the exhibition here.

Life as an Obstacle Course is an art project and program inspired by CC’s current exhibition Residential by the artist collective Project Art Works. The project explores the challenges that young people at FGU (Preparatory Basic Education) face in their daily lives, while promoting a positive approach to these challenges. Throughout the project, the young participants have been given a platform to express their diverse perspectives through creative workshops, a performance, and with tools they have developed themselves, inspired by methods from Project Art Works. The program has resulted in works that are available for purchase in CC’s shop for the remainder of the Residential exhibition period. They work with a color palette that symbolizes the extremes of life with challenges – both the difficult and the powerful. In addition to exploring barriers, the project celebrates the young people’s unique strengths, energy, and creativity, while challenging perceptions of neurodivergence through art.

Life as an Obstacle Course was created in collaboration between FGU and CC, and has led to these products developed by the students themselves. The proceeds from the sales will go to the FGU Copenhagen workshops. The project is supported by the Roskilde Festival Foundation.