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20161103

Visited Kankaanpää Art School were I’ll work as a mentor for a group of five graduating fine art students. Some are drawn to live-arts and others are interested in the performativity of objects and spaces (artworks). They’ll exhibit their graduation pieces at the Seinäjoki Art Hall. This is the first time I’ll be working as a graduate menton and I’m exited about the opportunity. 

The downside is that I’ve been sitting in busses and cars for 15 hours to mentor students for four hours! This is what it takes to build culture and develop performing arts in Finland. The buss ride from Helsinki to Kpää took seven hours. After the student sessions I got a ride to Tampere from Jarno Vesala, who is working as a mentor for an other student group (the mentor team also includes Petri Alamaunus and Hanna Oinonen). On the ride we exchanged notes on how to build media awareness in our children and the sincerity of vblogging. From there I continued by buss towards Helsinki. On route I met Outi Yli-Viikari and Jaakko Pimperi. We chatted all the way. The trip was fun.

Catching up on OG Maco. 

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20161031

Visited an exhibition after-party at the Ingredients-space over the weekend. The event was a celebration of Irina Korina’s work (On display at Alkovi) and hosted by Arttu Merimaa & Miina Hujala. Saw Paula and had a pleasant chat with Arash Moori a sound artist who is working at HIAP. We exchanged notes on the experience of playing music live and how sometimes one can get the feeling that there is something (or someone) extra inside the sound.

Today I participated “Kollab talkshop on local activism” event at M-Cult. Riikka Kuoppala & Thomas Martin presented their Maunula-movie project, Mikko Lipiäinen gave a short overview of the Transformative Pulp project (which I’m a big fan of) and Emilia Palonen talked about local democracy developments in relation to the Maunula-house.

Made videos for the upcoming performativity lecture:

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20161029

​An incredibly cynical video detailing the future of urban life and warfare made by the American military complex: Megacities: Urban Future, the Emerging Complexity. 

A nifty text on cultural imperialism by Pilvi Porkola What is ‘esitys’ on the University of Arts “How to do things with performance?” project blog. She is critical about Richard Schechner’s “Performance Studies. Introduction” which I’ve been studying in preparation of our upcoming Art School Maa course. 

I should make a kettlebell out of Snellman’s head. 

Visited SIC 2 gallery spaces opening exhibition The movement that didn’t have a dog and a stick… The exhibition was curated by Mikko Kuorinki and Diego Bruno who have been working together on a project they call Ruler. My favorite work was “Joycean Society” (2013) by Dora García. In discussion with Topi Äikäs I came into the conclusion that the exhibition was fuelled with sincere trust for the arts. Topi and I had difficulty in participating in the feeling because we know that the production of such exhibitions is always messy. Messiness is the opposite of Accountability. I have trouble trusting mess (even if I know that art is at it’s best as mess). 

We chatted about the 9/11 events in USA. Topi gave an honest account on how he felt after hearing about the attacks. His honesty cleansed the air and I suddenly remembered feeling suppressed delight. At the time we had been both excited about seeing the imperialists twin towers collapse and celebrated the attacks against the high standing symbols of global capitalism.

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20161028

If I’ve understood “Situated Knowledges: […]” by Donna Haraway correctly, she claims provocatively that the ones oppressed by the system do not understand the system better than the oppressors (I believe she’s arguing in this manner in an effort to motivate women into engaging with “hard-sciences”).

“To see from below is neither easily learned or unproblematic, even if ‘we’ ‘naturally’ inhabit the great underground terrain of subjugated knowledges. […] The standpoints of the subjugated are not ‘innocent’ positions. […] ‘Subjugated’ standpoints are preferred because they seem to promise more adequate, sustained, objective, transforming accounts of the world. But how to see from below is a problem requiring at least as much skill with bodies and language, with the mediations of vision, as the ‘highest’ technoscientific visualizations.”

Derrida insisted that all human codes and cultural expressions are “writing” and that everything can be understood as text. This means that bodies bashing against structures and seeking affordances, are in fact “reading” our culture. From this perspective the ones that are exposed to the violence of our system have more access to to it’s structures! Do victims understand crimes better than criminals?

Interesting video Black Market International Documentary (2005).