Arkens café
Foto: Frida Gregersen

Learning

In education courses, we work together in an open and investigative learning space. There is no right or wrong. A clear framework is set based on diverse and creative approaches, but where we end up, the class or team help to influence. Together we experiment in creative processes and put art into new words. Everyone is included as valuable voices in a shared laboratory.

90 minuttes:
We take a dialogical, inquiring and creative approach to the artwork in ARKEN's exhibitions.
Target audience: Primary and secondary schools.
Price: 750 dkk.

180 minuttes:
We take a dialogical, inquiring and creative approach to the artwork in ARKEN's exhibitions and immerse ourselves in experimental and creative processes in ARKEN's workshop.
Target audience: Primary and secondary schools.
Price: 1,500 dkk.

Self-guided visits


You're welcome to visit ARKEN on your own. We offer free admission to all preschools, primary schools and secondary schools. All visits must be booked at least 5 days in advance. You can book here.
It is possible to book self-guided visits on Wednesdays, Thursdays and Fridays.

If you have any questions about booking or lessons, please feel free to write to us at booking@arken.dk.

Learning and booking

Julian Charrière, Solarstalgia. Photo: Studio Julian Charrière
Solarstalgia — Julian Charrière 16.12.24 — 18.04.25

In this exhibition, we are invited back to a past world of lush forests and deep swamps. We are invited to reflect on humans' use and abuse of natural resources, and how we affect the environment and its ecosystems. The name of the exhibition is a play on the concept of Solastalgia, which means a deep fear of environmental change and climate collapse, and it encourages us to become better at taking care of nature.

In the teaching course, the students go on a journey through time that leads back to a world of plants and prehistoric gardens, before they arrive to the same areas transformed by industry in our present.
The exhibition is the second in ARKEN's exhibition trilogy NATURE FUTURE, which focuses on the relationship between man, nature and technology.
The course is adapted to the age and prerequisites of the target group.

Book course
Book 90-minute courses for primary schools  
Book a 90-minute course for youth education

Ursula Reuter Christiansen, Vred brud (angry bride), 1975. (Private collection)
I Am Fire and Water — Ursula Reuter Christiansen 03.09.24-03.01.25

For the exhibition I Am Fire and Water, Ursula Reuter Christiansen has created artworks that speak to both emotions and senses. The artist herself describes the exhibition as a kind of 'journey through different landscapes.'
In the educational program, students join Ursula on a journey that leads across bridges, past towers, and through landscapes. Each zone offers new images, sounds, and atmospheres, which we explore together through dialogue, reflection, and performative exercises. Along the journey, students experience how they collectively create new meanings in the encounter with Ursula's powerful visual language.
The educational program is adapted to the age and background of the target group.

Book course
Book 90-minute courses for primary schools

Book a 90-minute course for youth education

Educational Courses

Photo: Frida Gregersen
“Meta” course for educators and educational science students — 120 minutes — DKK 1,500

Educatorss and educational science students gain first-hand experience of what it means to participate as a student in one of ARKEN'S topical learning lessons when they're thrown into a lesson as if they were a primary school class. Afterwards, we frame a reflection room where ARKEN's methods and practices are in focus.

Target audience: Educators and educational science students.

For educators and educational science students, participating in a "meta" course can be a valuable experience on several levels. They gain insight into special art-pedagogical methods developed at ARKEN with art as a field of study. They also gain insight into applying the methods widely: in professional or interdisciplinary contexts, as well as from an educational perspective.

Furthermore, testing ARKEN's learning course on their own provides general insight into the unique potentials in experiential learning in an external learning environment such as a cultural institution.

Write to us at booking@arken.dk if you would like to book a “meta” course.

Partnership courses

Photo: Frida Gregersen
Preschool course

Our preschool course is based on stories from picture books, which have been presented to the children in advance by their educators. We identify with the characters of the book and “play the story forward” at ARKEN. The museum's spaces and works of art become selected props for a scenography for a sensory journey. Along the way, we explore art and architecture with our senses and take creative approaches that include all children and that support a common experiential language. There is room to integrate children's ideas and curiosity for the museum space and their shared history.

Target audience: Preschoolers from the age of 4

These are partnership courses that include pre-education and workshops and are arranged with municipal contact persons as well as preschool leaders in advance of a school year.

The special methods of our preschool course were developed in the project 'Visual art spaces on short legs'. Through close collaboration with local preschools, we have developed preschool courses that cater to children's interests when they visit a large art museum 'on short legs', perhaps for the very first time.

Write to us at booking@arken.dk for more information about our partnership process.

Photo: Frida Gregersen
KV-LAB — 2 days

This course in the Creative Elective Studies Laboratory (KV-LAB) addresses the subject of visual arts in education. We focus on how to experiment and utilise non-linear creative processes. We also focus on putting words to art, experiments and processes. KV-LAB is currently part of a development project and will only be put into operation as a partnership programme in the 2024-25 school year.

The KV-LAB also aims to develop the competences of visual arts teachers through educator workshops and mutual learning in partnership.

Target audience: Primary school 7th and 8th grade (visual arts electives)

Photo: Natalia Semenova
K-LAB — 3 days

In our Creative Elective Studies Laboratory (KV-LAB), we work in-depth with the study of selected works of art or exhibitions. We also take a deep dive into the experimental and creative workshop processes that arise from the encounter with art. The course lasts three days of 4 hours each and takes place both at ARKEN and at the school. KV-LAB courses are partnership courses that are agreed with the school management/municipality prior to a new school year.

Previous experience with educator workshops is an integral part of the KV-LAB partnership.

The methods and partnership approach taken in KV-LAB have been developed in the Creative Elective Studies Laboratory development project.

Target group: Primary schools

Practical information
Cloakroom

Bags, drinks and food may not be brought into the exhibition area, but must be stored in the cloakroom. The cloakroom at ARKEN may be used free of charge. Lockers can be locked with a personal 4-digit code.

Lunch break

Schools and institutions may eat their lunches in the basement. There can be quite a large number of school classes visiting ARKEN in the mornings, so in the warmer months we encourage you to enjoy your lunch in the outdoor areas on the Museum Island or at Ishøj Beach Park just a two-minute walk from the museum, where there are tables, benches and public toilets.

Photography

You are more than welcome to take photographs, but flashes are not permitted. Any artwork that you are not permitted to photograph will be clearly marked.

Help us take care of the artwork

The artwork at ARKEN is fragile and irreplaceable, so please make it clear to all students that the art must not be touched.

Can we use the workshop?

The CREATIVE workshop is reserved on weekdays for the museum's own lessons. We encourage you to bring your own drawing supplies if you want to sit in the exhibitions and immerse yourself in the artwork.

Be considerate

Pupils must always be accompanied by a teacher/adult. It can be tempting to run in the museum's giant halls, but for safety reasons - for your own safety and the safety of the artwork - please no running or roughhousing.

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Arken café sidepladser
Foto: Natalia Semenova for Skoletjenesten – videncenter for eksterne læringsmiljøer