A focus on Finnish media art at the 16th Seoul International New Media Festival (NEMAF) kicks off the new exchange programme between Finland, Korea and Japan. The programme is a fruit of AV-arkki’s extensive collaboration with HIAP (Helsinki International Artist Programme) and… Read more »
Salla Tykkä’s Retrospective in the competition @ Curtas Vila do Conde
Salla Tykkä’s Retrospective is selected for the international competition of Curtas Vila do Conde, held from July 9–17 in Vila do Conde, Portugal. The festival is a major cinematographic and cultural event in Portugal. Premiered in the international competition of… Read more »
The House
Erkki Kurenniemi
New work
A group of friends (some of them prominent figures in the 1960s psychedelic art scene) enjoy a relaxed afternoon in the kitchen of a hippie commune in Helsinki.
Read more »Christmas Mystery
Erkki Kurenniemi
New work
Christmas Mystery is Kurenniemi’s only scripted short film. In this farce, Kurenniemi and his friends present an ad lib interpretation of the Christmas Evangelium, starting from the Immaculate Conception and ending with the Three Wise Men studying the Tibetan Book of the Dead. Kurenniemi himself plays the Infant... Read more »
Florence
Erkki Kurenniemi
New work
Shot during a trip to a conference on electro-acoustic music, Florence is a rich collage of double exposures. Images from the Alps, Milano, and Florence are merged with impressions from the Finnish summer. The 16mm Pathé ciné-camera enabled Kurenniemi to wind back, revisit and reshoot the same... Read more »
Electronics in the World of Tomorrow
Erkki Kurenniemi
New work
Close-ups reveal the full decorativity of integrated circuits and other components in the colourful clippings from the American Electronics magazine. When Kurenniemi makes them spin on the turntable, their charm becomes vertiginous. The choreography of electronics in the world of tomorrow is combined with the somewhat... Read more »
Flora & Fauna
Erkki Kurenniemi
New work
Flora & Fauna embraces the dark charms of nature. Rich, colourful close-ups of flowers, leaves, ants, spiders, and inchworms blend into the silent mystique of water and woods. Kurenniemi’s original 16 mm film were all silent, but in 2003 Mika Taanila and Kurenniemi added for this version... Read more »
The Punched Tape of Life
Erkki Kurenniemi
New work
Kurenniemi’s short films are prognostic in their way of conflating technology with the everyday through montage and double exposures. Shot at the Department of Nuclear Physics at the University of Helsinki, the images of The Punched Tape of Life illustrate the beauty of 1960s information technology. These decorative... Read more »
Computer Music
Erkki Kurenniemi
New work
The film stars two computers: Elliott 803 (in the Department of Nuclear Physics, the University of Helsinki) and IBM 1130 (in the computer centre at the University of Turku). At times, the coexistence of man and machine provokes suffocating frustration. This is only the starting point for something more subtle: the art... Read more »
Tuomas A. Laitinen’s The Powder of Sympathy at the competition of Hamburg ISFF
Tuomas A. Laitinen’s The Powder of Sympathy is screened at “No Budget Competition” of the 32nd Hamburg International Short Film Festival, held from May 31 to June 6. Premiered at Rotterdam International Film Festival in January, The Powder of Sympathy… Read more »
Tailor
Saara Ekström
New work
The video follows the delicate choreography of a tailor at work. His hands decipher the fabric as a form of braille, a tactile writing system written as raised dots embossed on paper. The soundscape, created entirely in a Foley studio, brings a deceptionally realistic level to the work.
Read more »Phantasma
Saara Ekström
New work
The camera transports the viewer through the dreamlike, delirious and dilapidated rooms of an aquarium that opened in Copenhagen in 1939. The organic merges with the mechanical as time drives these opposite elements towards a joint destruction, creating something new.
Read more »Allegory of the Cave
Joakim Pusenius
New work
The moment of solitude replaces truth in the world that is destined to be left unfinished, unanswered; in the world that is always leaning outside of itself without consistency; in the world that is full of castrated fiction and artificial sunlight.
Read more »Ordinary Killing
Teemu Mäki
New work
A short film about homicide, based on an interview with Chief Physician and Research Professor Hannu Lauerma, who has treated and examined criminals. In the film, the documentary clips and subtitled interview is attached to the music from the third act of Bliss, an opera composed by Antti Auvinen and directed by Teemu... Read more »
Finnish Guy Dancing
Teemu Keisteri
New work
Finnish guy dancing in a homevideo with hotpants.
Read more »Plastic Child
Carolin Koss
New work
Plastic Child is about a journey of a child who lives in a contaminated plastic world. He is the heir to a single living plant which gives him the air to breath and eventually delivers hope for the humankind. Plastic Child is part of the trilogy Emerald Green, which deals with a dystopian world, where nature has been... Read more »
One Shot
Jan Ijäs
New work
The 2010 FIFA World Cup Final was the most watched single moment in the history of humankind. One Shot reveals what else happened in that same moment if one chose to look elsewhere. A group of 55 painters, architects, cinematographers, directors and other artists was asked to turn their gaze away from football and to... Read more »
Emerald Green
Carolin Koss
New work
A three-channel video installation about a dystopian world in which obscure forces steer a global fate, nature has been rendered extinct, breathable air has become... Read more »
Game Boys
Minna Suoniemi
New work
Game Boys shows young men in a "Who can last longer?" game trying to point a heavy gun as long as they can. Their faces and bodies bend and twist in this duel where there are no winners.
Read more »Parametronomicon (Triptych)
Pink Twins
New work
Parametronomicon presents a model of parametric virtual life. A biomechanic organism moves, multiplies and regenerates in an elaborate series of convulsive movements. Its life spans simple formations to inevitable apocalyptic visions of an over-the-top visual orgy. The triptych version expands the parametric concept... Read more »
Circle
Jenni Toikka
New work
The video parallels biathlon with visual art: a good performance by an athlete corresponds to the “flow” of artistic working process. The movement and visual composition reveal the mentality behind the competitive sports. We return to the target at the end, but the journey has left its mark on our minds.
Read more »Conversation in Pieces
Jani Ruscica
New work
Like a sprawling, inconclusive conversation, 'Conversation in Pieces' enlists six objects to reflect upon issues related to representation.
Read more »Finnish media art @ MOI Helsinki, Beijing, May 13–15
A selection of Finnish media art is is screened as a part of MOI Helsinki event in Beijing from May 13–15. The programme is curated by Kaisa Salmi and features both single channel video works and multi-channel installations by a… Read more »
A Friend
Pekka Sassi
New work
Happy hippie kinetic film. A Friend is a contructive abstract short film about something cold and distant turning into warm and friendly. It’s a kinetic folksong. Hooray to Liz Rhodes and Donovan.
Read more »Bad News from Heaven
Pekka Sassi
New work
Metaphysical hooligans meet the concept of heaven. The second part of the four-part saga about Kolya and Yuri.
Read more »Making Art Video
Pekka Sassi
New work
Making Art Video is a documentary about making a video by the same name. The artist is trying to describe his works and advice the viewer. The video shows how difficult it is to translate visual thinking into verbal language.
Read more »Raimo S
Nestori Syrjälä
New work
A retired statesman, the embodiment of economic growth and progress, is trying to come to terms with the disorientating reality of the ecological crisis. The character is based on former Finnish State Secretary Raimo Sailas.
Read more »History Bleeds Under Your Fingernails
Azar Saiyar
New work
We used to believe that being left-handed could lead to criminality, stupidity, and immoral behaviour. So we tried to educate our children not to use that hand. History Bleeds Under Your Fingernails is a short film on the history of taming the left hand and on the culture of cultivating the bodies that do not fit.
Read more »First There Is Nothing
Marja Viitahuhta
New work
A one-shot image of a blizzard: snowflakes and wind. The image is simultaneously a still shot and full of movement. Accompanied with a voice-over text on how things are born.
Installation version also available.
Read more »
An Unusual Step
Pasi Autio
New work
A male protagonist a is balancing and slowly stepping a single, six minute stepping cycle in a busy street corner. His advancing is dictated by a verbal description of what happens in his body as he steps extremely slowly forward.
Read more »