Slow television
television genre featuring a very long television coverage of an ordinary event in its complete length
Slow television, or slow TV (Norwegian: sakte-TV), is a genre of "marathon" television coverage of an ordinary event in its complete length. Its name is derived both from the long endurance of the broadcast as well as from the natural slow pace of the television programme's progress. It was popularised in the 2000s by the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation (NRK), beginning with the broadcast of a seven-hour train journey in 2009.
Background
An early example of extended length cinematography was artist Andy Warhol's 1964 film Sleep, which showed poet John Giorno sleeping for five hours and twenty minutes. Warhol's production process involved splicing and looping of film that he had originally shot in 3-4 minute lengths. The concept was adapted to slow television on local TV broadcast in 1966 by WPIX, to VHS video tape in 1984 by the British company Video125, to satellite TV in 2003 by Bahn TV, and to live TV in 2011 by the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation (NRK).
The latest evolution of the concept started with the NRK's coverage of the longest driver's eye view at that time, showing the complete 7-hour train ride along the Bergen Line (Norwegian: Bergensbanen) on 27 November 2009. It was followed by the live coverage of the Hurtigruten ship MS Nordnorge during its 134-hour voyage from Bergen to Kirkenes starting on 16 June 2011.
Both events received extensive attention in both Norwegian and foreign media, and were considered a great success with coverage numbers exceeding all expectations and record ratings for the NRK2 channel.
Earlier examples
Several artists have created films or videos which paved the way for slow television.
The public source identifies “Slow television” as television genre featuring a very long television coverage of an ordinary event in its complete length. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Slow, television and genre.
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Reception evidence should be dated and situated: later canonical status may differ sharply from the work’s initial circulation. The source revision retrieved here is dated May 21, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q3377903. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 2009, 1964, 1966 and 1984.
Rights, attribution and provenance may remain disputed even when a general reference summary presents a stable account. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
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This entry incorporates text from “Slow television” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.