Photography Studies at Aalto University

You can now buy fine art prints by photography students from the Aalto University Shop in Väre!

‘Fotoworks’ is a selection of fine art prints from students at Aalto University’s Department of Photography. The prints are experiments or works-in-progress that have been produced by the students throughout their studies.

All prints are inkjet, on Hahnemuhle Photo Rag Fine Art Paper and are signed by the artists.

Opening this week!

Rasmus Mäkelä – Drawing a circle
Kymi, Gallery Uusi Kipinä, Lahti
6.–24.7.2022

Drawing a circle was born out of Mäkelä’s desire to find a new approach to his work process. A new fascination with performance blended with Mäkelä’s background as a skater and a photographer, which led to a completely new body of work made in the spring and summer of 2022.
In his exhibition Mäkelä contemplates bodiliness, the circle, repetition and the pursuit of perfection. The exhibition consists of two performative video works, photographs and handmade ceramic replicas of skateboard wheels.
The shooting location for the performances was the Helsinki convention centre – a place where skaters aren’t welcome. Mäkelä wishes to show the misunderstood sport in an alternative light; as performative art that belongs to urban surroundings.

The exhibition is supported by the Arts Promotion Centre Finland and Finnfoto.

http://rasmusmakela.com/

Congrats to Dominik Fleischmann and Lotta Blomberg on their solo exhibitions opening tonight at Hippolyte Gallery, Helsinki:

Dominik Fleischmann
The scent of flowers
A touch of the earth
May 6-29, 2022
Photo gallery Hippolyte

The Scent of Flowers, Touch of the Earth exhibition is dedicated to mice and rats exploited in the name of science. By combining photographs of animals bred for experiments and dry flowers, the exhibition seeks to spark a debate about the ethical and moral disadvantages of animal experiments and the detachment of man from nature. Fading flowers symbolize grief and sorrow, but they also have beauty and comfort. As with the innocent idea that in the permanent reciprocity of nature, nothing will ever die, life will only change its shape.

The series is inspired by the novel Flowers by Algernon (1969) by American author Daniel Keyes, in which a man and a mouse go through the same experiment to increase their intelligence. The themes of the book are still relevant in a society that values ​​reason and intelligence instead of love and empathy - in a society that normalizes the treatment of life as a resource. The contrast between documentary images, personal notes and videos, and the clash between paper, flowers, earth and steel, ask us to fulfill our mission as part of a breathing world.

http://www.mysilentkingdom.com/

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Lotta Blomberg
Shifting Channels
May 6-29, 2022
Hippolyte Studio

Lotta Blomberg’s exhibition at Shifting Channels Hippolyte Studio examines the physiology of vision, imagination, and tactile tactility. The central work in the exhibition, a seven-square-meter rug, is based on a microscopic image of a blind spot in the artist’s own eye. In the image of the rug, the meandering veins of the groping are a prerequisite for vision, but at the same time, together with the optic nerve, they cause a blind spot of observation, a blind spot.

In the words of architect Juhani Pallasmaa, “All the senses, including sight, are an extension of the sense of touch; the senses are specializations of the skin tissue, and all sensory experiences are forms of contact and thus akin to tact. ” aptly describe Blomberg’s way of thinking about photography as an experimental art form. By choosing a porous rug to represent a medical image, the artist equates the rod and pin cells of the retina with the texture of the image tissue while challenging the usual ways of presenting a photograph.

https://www.lottablomberg.com/

Mari Hokkanen's exhibition Pearl Weaver is currently exhibited at Yö Gallery, Helsinki!

Helmenpunoja - Mari Hokkanen
Yö-Gallery

Lönrotinkatu 33, Helsinki
28.1-13.2.2022

Tue-Fri: 2-7pm
Sat-Sun: 12-5 pm

Poetic phrasing is often compared to a pearl in Islamic culture. A poem can be seen as a string of pearls. Helmenpunoja is a string of photographic poems and performances with symbolic references to the world of ancient Persian poetry.

The images are influenced by the oldest poetry known to humanity. However, they reflect the foundation which I stand on as a photographer. My first visit to Iran in 2016 was to visit the grave of the great 15th century poet Hafez. The following years I went back to Iran two times, working in residences, familiarizing myself with the culture and poetry and of course to take photographs.

Mari Hokkanen is a photo artist based in Helsinki, Finland. Her self-portraits are narrative, enacted episodes, mostly set in colorful installations, built from recycled materials. Her surrealistic scenes deal with serious issues but often there is an element of wit and humour to her work; sometimes dark or deadpan, other times playful and childlike. Her work has been shown in solo and group exhibitions in Finland and abroad, for example in Scotland, Estonia, Sweden, Germany, Portugal and Spain.

Congrats to Sanni Saarinen on her exhibition KOHTI, still showing at the Museum of Photography Estonia. Be sure to visit if you are in Tallinn this month!

KOHTI - Sanni Saarinen
5.11.2021 – 27.02.2022
Museum of Photography, Estonia

Sanni Saarinen´s exhibition KOHTI is open in the Museum of Photography of Estonia until 28th of February. KOHTI is a Finnish word meaning “towards”, but Saarinen translates it into the act of trying to reach something. She studies those moments where seemingly nothing happens, but in a way, all of life happens. She is interested in questions of shared memories, of family, of growth, of the passing of time and of the border between the imagined and the real, what really happened and how we experienced it. Saarinen is an MA student at Aaltouniversity.

https://www.sannisaarinen.com/

Sheung Yiu's solo show 'Ground Truth, or How To Resurrect a Tree' opens tonight in Helsinki at Maatila Project Space from 2-7pm.

Ground Truth, or How To Resurrect a Tree
Opening: Tuesday, 2.2.2022 at 14:00
Duration: 2.2 - 20.2.2022
Location: MAA-tila, Pääskylänrinne 10, 00500 Helsinki
Opening hours: Wed–Fri 2–6pm, Sat–Sun 1–5pM

* To visit the exhibition please wear a face mask and consider the safety distance. The opening is extended to five hours to spread out visitor flow and ensure a safe distance between visitors. You are welcome to visit anytime from 2-7pm*
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Ground Truth, or How To Resurrect a Tree
Sheung Yiu (HK/FI)

Ground Truth is a story about ‘seeing something when there is nothing there.’ Zoom into a digital image long enough, and one will eventually reach a pixel — the point where the camera can no longer resolve visual information. It is at the pixel where the story of perspectival seeing ends and the computational vision begins. Equipped with the power of computation, photography, and hyperspectral imaging, a group of scientists in Finland set out to overcome the spatial resolution limit of forest satellite imagery.

http://www.sheungyiu.com/

MA student Lyydia Osara's exhibition 'Impressions of the Mind' opens next Wednesday at Tischenko Gallery, be sure to take a look if you are in Helsinki!

'Impressions of the Mind'
Lyydia Osara
19.1-29.1.2022
Tischenko Gallery, Fredrikinkatu 64, Helsinki

Statement:
Impressions of the Mind is a series of experimental photographs constructed in the theme of mental health, in discovery of making invisible emotions visible by using alternative photographic methods and free forms of abstraction.

Bio:
Lyydia Osara (b. 1996) is a Finnish experimental photographic artist based in Helsinki, Finland. Often working with camera-less methods, she works with the very bases of photography, light, chemicals and light sensitive material. By creating abstract imagery, she relies on non-representational expression as her tool. Through exploring deep human emotion with experimental photography, she has found a growing interest in exploring the boundaries within the photographic art form.

https://www.lyydiaosara.com/

Doctoral candidate Sheung Yiu is launching his new book, Ground Truth, in Helsinki this Saturday at 5pm with the Temporary Bookshelf! Congrats Sheung!

Ground Truth:
What is the relation between what we see and what is there? "Ground Truth" observes the evolution of visual technology in conversation with our perception and surroundings. The more technology develops, the more abstract seeing becomes. Equipped with the phenomenal power of computation, photography and hyperspectral imaging, a group of scientists set out to approach the boundaries of satellite imaging in the forests of Finland. Using meticulous on-site measurements of physical structures and spectral properties of trees, "ground truth" data are experimental results to verify the performance of predicting models. Their quest is to develop an improved interpretation model of satellite data for remote sensing research, which allows us to distinguish various features of the surface beyond what is shown optically in satellite imagery.

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The Eriskay Connection is a Dutch studio for book design and an independent publisher. We focus on contemporary storytelling at the intersection of photography, research and writing. In close collaboration with authors we make books as autonomous bodies of work that provide us with new and necessary insights into the world around us. The key for us is to convey the essence of their work through high quality editing, design and production. Our editions are mainly offset printed and bound in The Netherlands and we strive to work with local producers and sustainable materials as much as possible.

When: Saturday 27.11 17-20:00
Where: Kosminen, Pursimiehenkatu 13,00150 Helsinki
Links to the event: https://fb.me/e/1c4Iu4Mij
https://www.instagram.com/p/CWiz3UctmLZ/

More about the book:
https://www.instagram.com/p/CWk7DMJNXsV/, https://www.eriskayconnection.com/home/114-ground-truth.html
Book designed by Emery Norton
Book Published by The Eriskay Connection
Event visual designed by Albane Durand-Viel

Jenni Toivonen's exhibition 'qual a cor do horizonte' is on display at Väre's V1 Gallery, be sure to take a look next time you are on campus!

Jenni Toivonen
qual a cor do horizonte
26.10.–8.11.2021

In 1929 a group of Finns, including Toivonen’s great grandparents and their family set out to Brazil to build a utopian community in the tropics. Their mission was to live in harmony with nature, separated from the capitalist society and to lead a life based on vegetarianism. The group settled on abandoned mountainous land in the state of Rio de Janeiro and founded Penedo, that despite its practical difficulties became one of the most famous examples of Finnish utopia migration during the 20th century. Today, the village is surrounded by the memory of the utopian era as well as by the highly biodiverse but endangered Atlantic Forest.

The exhibition 'qual a cor do horizonte' ('which is the colour of the horizon') investigates migration, memory and the connection between human and nature. It tells about the reflection of history in today’s world, as well as about the concept of utopia and longing for something distant as a catalyst for human action. At the core of the work lies a performative journey to the old village, where Toivonen tries to build a connection with the past by re-imagining and reconstructing it. Like with the original settlers, the work stems from a primitive desire to connect with the earth and the non-human world. Through rituals that immerse the human body in its environment, the artist explores the questions of origin, belonging and coexistence.

The exhibition includes parts of Toivonen’s body of work ‘Are We There’ (2019–) and combines photographs produced by multiple techniques, moving image and sound. Different parts of the project have previously been exhibited at the Finnish Museum of Photography (2020) and Foto Tallinn Art Fair (2021).

Jenni Toivonen (b.1993) is a visual artist based in Helsinki. The exhibition is a part of her MA thesis work in Photography at Aalto University.In her artistic work Toivonen is interested in investigating the connections between human and non-human e.g. through the materialities of the body and the environment.

The exhibition has been supported by Arts Promotion Centre Finland, The Finnish Cultural Foundation, Artproof & Aalto ARTS.

Open Mon-Fri 8am–8pm, Sat 9am–5pm
26.10.–8.11.2021
V1 Galleria
Väre, Otaniementie 14, Espoo

https://jennitoivonen.com/about/