Hanne Hammer Stien is based in Tromsø. In her curatorial work, she has mainly focused on art in public space and site-specific art projects that relates to the north, either as physical or discursive sites. Her last exhibition project was Iver Jåks: Material Sensitivity and Material Power (2022) at Tegnerforbundet in Oslo, co-curated with Kristoffer Dolmen. In one of Stien’s art in public space projects Inger Sitters monumental painting Composition in Yellow (1961/1962), commissioned for the fish filet factory Findus in Hammerfest, were relocated to a newly built primary school in Hammerfest. To reactivate Sitter’s painting, a painting by Marianne Hurum (Smith and soar, 2017) was commissioned.
Stien has been concerned with photo history and photo theory, museological and curatorial questions and contemporary art. One of Stien’s recent publication is Kunst som deling. Delingens kunst (Fagbokforlaget, 2020), co-authored with Merete Jonvik, Eivind Røssaak, and Arnhild Sunnanå. The book focuses on changing practices within the contemporary art field in Norway the last decade.
Stien holds a Ph.D. in art history from UiT The Arctic University of Norway (2017). She is Associate Professor at Academy of Arts at UiT The Arctic University of Norway and has previously been Vice-Director of The Arctic University Museum and Academy of Fine Arts and Director of the Polar Museum in Tromsø, both at UiT The Arctic University of Norway, Head of communication at Tromsø Kunstforening and Head of communication at the Museum of Reconstruction for Finnmark and Northern Troms in Hammerfest. She also worked for several years as a regular critic for Billedkunst.
Stien is a member of the board of research and development at the Arts Council Norway, a member of the Artistic Advisory Board of the Lofoten International Art Festival (LIAF) and on the Board of Kunstkritikk and Mađđi – Romsa Kunsthall. She is a member of the art historical research group Worlding Northern Art and participate in the research project Urban Transformation in a Warming Arctic (UrbTrans).
