BAR OMI will turn into a stage where nothing is quite as it seems. Artists Omid Kheirabadi, Shardenia Felicia, and Ariela Bergman will take over the bar for an ongoing interactive performance. The trio, who last collaborated on Carnisse in Flux, a two-month artistic research in Rotterdam Zuid exploring displacement and gentrification, arrive at OMI with a new experiment in collective storytelling and improvised interaction.

This open-ended work resists the “smooth city” ideal, those urban environments engineered for seamless efficiency, where everything works without friction and life runs on schedule all the time. That polished perfection is seductive, while it hides the instability, struggle, and inequality that underpin city life. In reality, things break, people stumble, and systems fail. And it is in those moments of failure that real human connection can be formed, and sometimes resistance, can surface.

Through the night, the myth of affordable housing, the feeling of being trapped in a money-making machine, and the absurdity of living under the system of debt, loans, and wages will hum beneath everything. The whole bar becomes a shifting set; visitors become part of the performance; and each “wrong order” becomes a moment of connection or disruption.

There will be revolutionary karaoke! And be ready for the surprise event: a one-night-only edible house auction to close the night!

• Omid Kheirabadi (b. 1992, Tehran) is a Rotterdam-based artist and interior architect whose work blends experimental performance with social critique to explore how resistance can be rehearsed collectively, from the bureaucratic absurdities of daily life to the deeper, often invisible systems that shape us. Omid’s practice centers on open-ended performance sessions: participatory gatherings that foster dialogue, improvisation, and shared presence.
• Shardenia Felicia is a visual artist born and raised in Curaçao, who uses art as a form of storytelling to explore themes of feminism, motherhood, racism, and culture. Rooted in her Caribbean heritage, her work gives voice to personal and collective narratives.
• Ariela Bergman is a filmmaker and visual artist, who lives between Argentina and the Netherlands. Her work combines documentary essay, CGI animation, and video art, exploring displacements of reality, sensory contaminations, and a sense of humor that navigates fragility, failure, solitude, and the female body.