As a Norwegian woman born in 1975, she is influenced by a particular feminist discourse. Through her temperament and interest in ecological understanding, she addresses significant and pressing issues of our time. Her chosen mediums vary, encompassing text, sound installations, relational dialogue, video performance, experimental films, and painting collages.
For 20 years, the artist Gitte Sætre has delved into concepts within the realm of WAR & PEACE (culture of perception management).As the writer and sociologist Linn Stalsberg writes in her book War is disrespect for Life, an essay on Peace: Working for peace means both social criticism today and visions for tomorrow. A peace vision is a long-term work session. Just as is the goal of climate-friendly societies. Along the way civil society has to engage in social criticism and politics, due to the fact that society's structures are built on war as the norm, with consequent natural destruction. And behind much of the climate crisis and many wars is the competition for raw materials, land, access to nature and the sea. It can be about growth, money, position and power. Expansion of markets, expansion of nations. There may be connections between capitalism and war.
The work of Gitte Sætre has been showcased at The Nobel Peace Senter in Oslo, Manifesta 13, Kunstnernes Hus in Oslo, the WhiteBox Gallery in New York, the Collateral Program of Kochi Biennale in India, Guramayne Art Center in Addis Ababa, Oslo Kunstforening, Media Impact in Moscow, Arctic Art Forum in Arkhangelsk, Komunitas Salihara in Jakarta, XX1 Gallery in Warsaw, Pristine Galerie in Mexico, Kunsthall 3.14 in Bergen and the KODE museum in Bergen to mention some. She has produced two performances at the National Theater in Bergen. Currently she is working on a large Peace Fresco for the Municipality of Oslo under the name Fresco Sisters.
In 2014, she journeyed to Jerusalem and conceived the Woman Cleaning video performance series, which continues to evolve. In 2016, she created "Magic of Seven," a seven-channel video installation featuring 7 women from 7 continents performing a peace ritual spanning our 7000-year history of violence. Subsequently, in 2019, she and her partner received a substantial grant to examine and engage public opinion on the green transition. By 2022, they had published a fable, a web-TV series titled "AreYouReady?", exploring perspectives beyond the human realm through trans-realism. The central character in this narrative was a resurrected tree from the lake near where Ludwig Wittgenstein wrote "Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus." As the tree was transported atop their KIA, it became imbued with a critical and poetic language, transforming into "The Living Unliving Surveillance Poet," functioning as an oracle and a gateway to deeper understanding. Sætre wrote much of the script and provided the voiceover, an experience that profoundly impacted her and led to a series of new questions, culminating in her next project: The Fresco Sisters. These inquiries are best explored through a language transcending mere representation, delving into paintings that go beyond depicting the visual or reproducing objects, people, or landscapes in a conventional form.
In her other works, Sætre examines generational roles and positions, grappling with philosophical inquiries such as forgiveness, guilt, and freedom within both familial and broader political contexts. Her oeuvre is distinguished by its engagement with the weighty issues of contemporary society, yet it also creates space for humor and contemplation.
The web-tv seris Are You Ready was in seven episodes and is online to be watched at www.areyouready.tv
Are You Ready? was a part of the Nature as Infrastructure, a virtual program curated by the Copenhagen-based artist collective The Winter Office (TWO). Organized within the frame of Manifesta 13.
Gitte Sætre ever-ongoing project Woman Cleaning has been shown internationally in several locations over the years. A series of video-performative penance where she washes places and/or objects. Sætre has constructed a figure that diligently washes and tries to create harmony and gain control or understanding of the world. The project is strongly linked to her as a person, a Norwegian female born in 1975. A generation that thought everything was possible. The project is within the sphere of national and international politics and touches upon rituals with religious connotations, feminism, humor, and hopes and dreams.
Worth mentioning, before she started on this extensive cleaning project with Woman Cleaning, her work related to the private sphere through a project called Mother Dust (Morstøv).
She collected dorm rabbits (hybelkaniner) from her house and used it as her artistic methodology. Photographing a small mass of dust as a series of work. House dust comprises hairs, fibers of cloths, crumbs, mold, mites, and bacteria. Waste is derived from the very essence of daily life and its symbols of our existence, as if it were the intimate microcosm that exposes one's activities.
Gitte Sætre often collaborate with people and organizations inside and outside the field of art, blow is a list of some of them.
Memoar.no
Norges Fredsråd
Humanity Project
Bergen Exchanges v/CMI og Siri Gloppen
International Progressive
Bioregion institute
NHRF.no v/ Ingeborg Moa
Global Coastline Rebellion
Women's International League for Peace and FreedomGlobal Salmon Farming Resistance
The AntiWar-Initiative
Artist for Assange
Woman Against NATO
Frans Jacobi
Studio Michelle-Marie Letelier
Ca Conrad
Chris Duckett
Brian Maguire
Marcelo Brodsky
Jannecke Heien Knutsen
Galleri Høgstandard