
The overarching theme of the fall season of AV-arkki and Cinema Orion’s Art for Art’s sake series is touch. The second show in the autumn series on November 5th examines the relationships between humans and other living beings. The works in the screening observe how humans are in contact with their environment and other species; touching can be affectionate and form connections with others, but touch can also hurt, infect or kill. The power relations between species come to light through the act of touch.
Art for Art’s Sake brings together artists’ moving image, media art and experimental film from Finland and around the world, novelties and classics. The series has been supported by the Kone Foundation, the Ministry of Education and Culture and the City of Helsinki. The series is curated by a working group consisting of Diego Ginartes, Sepideh Rahaa, Azar Saiyar and Avreno Heikka. The last Art for Art’s Sake of the year will take place on 10 December 2024.
Admission to the screenings is free!
Art for Art’s Sake: Touch Me
With Creatures Great and Small
5.11.2024 at 17:00
Cinema Orion

Maddi Barber:VGORRIA, 2020, 20′
Guts, a flock of sheep, spring. Doves’ cooing and songs sung with closed mouth. Some vultures, bones, flowers and many hands. Hands that feed, milk, caress, shear, film, hands that kill. Hands that embody the doubts and contradictions of the management of other species.

Fanni Niemi-Junkola: The Trainer, 2020, 4’10
The video depicts a dog and its trainer. The connection, nonverbal communication and trust is apparent. But the images also highlight the power relations and perhaps dependency on each other.

Jonathas de Andrade: O Peixe (The Fish), 2016, 23‘
Located on the Northeast coast of Brazil, a village of fishermen enact a ritual of embracing the fish that they have caught. The affectionate hug that accompanies the ritual marks a passage of death and a relationship between species that is imbued with an ambiguous sequence of gestures of tenderness, violence, and domination. The utopian dream of a harmonious community with its surroundings is a testament to the lack of connection between a man from the city and the nature that is at his service. Between fiction and reality, documentation and fantasy, the naturalness of domination hides the root of this relationship constituted by the constant exercise of strength, power and devotion.

Hanna Kaihlanen: Hovering Over Us, 2023, 16’41
Very small beings are often behind major events on the planet. Hovering over us observes mosquitoes, the tiny creatures that float around us. The hybrid film dives into a reality where the smallest creatures have become unpredictably significant. Past, present and the imaginative overlap and create strange visions, where uncanny details start to resemble prophecies and a human becomes a tiny piece of the big buzzing puzzle.

Helinä Hukkataival: Felis Catus, 2007, 4’
An unfocused image of black and white movement becomes gradually in focus, revealing an image of constantly moving kittens with their mother.
The total duration of the show is 68 minutes.
Please note: Some of the works contain violent treatment of animals and may not be suitable for the most sensitive viewers.