About Bloom
Bloom is an innovative festival that helps us reflect on nature, science, and ourselves.
Bloom is Denmark’s biggest ideas and science festival. Bloom was founded in 2015, and for the 2022 festival Bloom presented more than 100 unique events and had 12,000 visitors during the three festival days. Bloom 2023 will take place on the 26th to the 28th of May.
By uniting the best from the festival sphere and the world of science, Bloom tackles life’s great questions, inviting its audience to take part in two days of debates, talks, ideas, and walks under the open sky. Bloom presents some of the brightest researchers, scientists, philosophers, thinkers, and artists of our time. Everything takes place in a participative, recreational, and sensory setting, where concerts, food, art installations, an open laboratory, and other breathing spaces seduce and captivate.
Talks and content in English
FRIDAY
SPROUT – 16.15-16.45
Fernissage / Introducing: The Copenhagen Interpretation / Jens Settergren, Astrid Sonne & Irene Campolmi
SUMMER – 16.30-17.15
Mastermind / Being a Beast / Charles Foster
SPROUT – 17.30-18.00
A Taste of... / Fermentation / David Zilber
SUMMER – 18.00-19.00
Symposium / Earth Oddity / Peter Godfrey-Smith, Anil Seth & Charles Foster
SPROUT – 19.30-21.00
Science Game / Exploring Exoplanets / Pieter Steyart, Sven Kiefer & Jesper Bruun
SUMMER – 20.45-21.30
Mastermind / The Science of Fermentation / David Zilber
SATURDAY
SPROUT – 12.00-12.15
Tankefrø / A Botanical Perspective on Seeds / Natasha de Vere (the second presentation of three)
SUMMER – 12.15-13.00
Live artistic research / The Nature of Light / Kimsooja & Troels C. Petersen
SUMMER – 15.30-16.15
Mastermind / The Nature of Nature / Lorraine Daston
SUMMER – 17.15-18.00
Mastermind / The Mind of an Octopus / Peter Godfrey-Smith
SUMMER – 18.30-19.15
Film & talk / Time Animals / Isabella Martin & Zach Gerhart-Hines
SPROUT – 19.30-21.00
Science Game / Exploring Exoplanets / Pieter Steyart, Sven Kiefer & Jesper Bruun
SUMMER – 20.00-20.45
Symposium / The Food System / David Zilber, Michael Broberg Palmgren & Emma Holten
SUMMER – 21.45-22.30
Film & talk / Silent Extinction / Maja Friis & Cesar Pacherres
SUNDAY
SPRING – 12.45-13.30
Symposium / The Magnetic Earth/ Chris Finlay, Ilia Solov’yov & Tina Ibsen
SUMMER – 13.45-14.15
Mastermind / The Mystery of Consciousness / Anil Seth
SUMMER – 16.30-17.15
Mastermind / Missing Half the Universe/ Jeffrey S. Hangst
SPROUT – 17.00-17.45
Live artistic research / Flora Italica / Crystal Bennes & Natasha de Vere
I enjoyed the Bloom festival. I think the idea of Bloom is wonderful, and much needed. I was honored to have been invited.
The Bloom festival was for me a beautiful event; it was really inspiring to see so many people come out to hear people discuss ideas of all kinds, also listen to music, eat meals, and enjoy the green park. I was impressed by everything about it: the organization, the people running it, the park it was held in, and the people who came to it.
TALKS
Did dark matter kill the dinosaurs? Do trees have feelings? How can we be better at thinking logically in everyday life? Can thoughts and consciousness be expressed in mathematical formulas? What is it like to be a bat? What can we learn by slowing down light?
New research, new discoveries, the world’s most ground-breaking scientific theories, and different ways of viewing nature will all unfold in talks and conversations with upcoming and leading researchers.
WALKS
Come outside and discover the sprouting spring. Feel the nature around you and learn from the ants, the hoverflies, the bees, the butterflies, the tulip tree, the beech, the oak tree, and the other flora and fauna in the park.
You can also hear about and follow in the footsteps of historical scientists, like H.C. Ørsted or Niels Bohr, who went on regular walks through this park to clear their heads.
MUSIC, LITERATURE & ART
Reset your brain and experience the green nooks of the park as they inflate with live music, poetry recitals, and art performances.
Previous years, we have presented new work by pioneering composer Louise Alenius, live research conducted by writer Kaspar Colling Nielsen, an installation by artist Lea Porsager, a new sound work by Jacob Kirkegaard etc.
Bloom is produced by the cultural organisation ADBC in collaboration with the University of Copenhagen (Faculty of Science) and Roskilde Festival among others, and with support from the Carlsberg Foundation, which especially supports activities that benefit the community and are related to science.
With twenty-five years of experience in producing innovative festivals and knowledge activities, ADBC is Denmark’s leading supplier of knowledge and culture. ADBS runs a historical festival, Golden Days, every September with more than two-hundred events spread across sixteen days, which is one of Copenhagen’s most visited festivals.
Headliners for previous festivals included science fiction writer Kim Stanley Robinson (US), Professor of Astrophysics Dame Jocelyn Bell Burnell (IE/UK), Harvard Professor of Theoretical Physics Lisa Randall (US), Professor of Genetics at King’s College London Tim Spector (UK), Professor of Geology Minik Rosing (GL/DK), Professor of Paleoanthropology Donald Johanson (US), Professor of Genetics Eske Willerslev (DK), writer Jeff VanderMeer (US), and Science Journalist Carl Zimmer (US).