The Danish Contemporary Art Scene - ArtHub Copenhagen

A digital mapping and analysis of actors, dynamics and trends in the Danish contemporary art world provides recommendations for partnerships and areas of expansion for the emerging art center ArtHub Copenhagen.

#ContemporaryArt #ArtHub #DigitalAnalysis #DigitalMapping

Problem

ArtHub works to enable and host young artists in the contemporary art world by organizing events, showings and collaborations. With the support of Bikubenfonden, ArtHub wants to map the contemporary art scene digitally to uncover new potentials for collaboration and fundings through a fine-grained analysis of contemporary art communities and themes.

Solution

ArtHub identifies a list of artists, galleries, curators, institutions participating in the contemporary art scene to investigate. The analysis makes use of all Instagram mentions of these actors, through a network mapping of the social media conversation between relevant users. This allows us to identify which actors engage more with each other, and which communities are formed. The Instagram posts of the identified communities are also investigated qualitatively and with the aid of quantitative and NLP techniques, to identify common themes and emerging trends and conversations. Changing perspective, we also harvest all Instagram posts containing hashtags related to the Danish art scene, and map such a conversation in a network similar to the first one. In such a way, we are able to identify further actors that are not already known by ArtHub, to suggest new communities and partnership potentials.

Result

The analysis made it possible to identify the most central actors, as well as sub-communities and clusters, that are key in the contemporary art scene. Such knowledge, together with the analysis of the most discussed themes by actors and communities, can help ArtHub in identifying and fostering theme-centered and strategic partnerships, with both known and unfamiliar actors.