This immersive event celebrates the universal human experience through the lenses of history and ancestry, featuring a diverse array of photographers whose works capture the essence of different cultures and historical moments.
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Hey,
My name is Nora Winslow Keene, and I’m a committed public interest attorney. Living in Denver, Colorado, I’ve spent years championing the rights of underrepresented workers. A graduate of Stanford University, I played a key role in securing critical protections for agricultural laborers, ensuring better wages and access to healthcare. My work has focused on advocating for environmental justice and improving the quality of life for rural communities. Every case I take on is driven by the belief that everyone deserves dignity and fair treatment in the workplace.
I have photographed portraits of childhood friends over seventy, and moments with young people where the sense of belonging becomes unmistakably present.
In his project, Jari Silomäki has photographed moments that visualize symmetry of human feelings either in a direct or symbolic manner. This includes portraits of childhood friends, who are now over 70 years old, as well as scenes with young people, whose shared fragile experiences form their identities.
The series began when Russia attacked Ukraine, a dreadful move that has radically challenged the sense of security in Europe. This development shaped Silomäki’s approach to observe events more softly than ever before. The war also affects the way we consume art and, especially photography, in which a human gaze is at the very core of the medium.
In the portraits of childhood friends, people are looking at each other’s eyes through decades of friendship. And, as a photographer, Silomäki is looking at them. The direct look of a life-long friend is a deep and multifaceted experience. The friend’s gaze can be seen as a tool with which we understand and communicate experiences and feelings. It can also remind us of the passing of time, change, respect, and love.
In the scenes with young people, cityscapes glow with warm light. Here the feeling of togetherness and belonging is palpable. Shared experiences are an essential part of our understanding of the world. They emerge when people are capable of deep empathy towards each other. The warm cityscapes attempt to witness that very moment. They share with the portraits similar emotional terrain. For instance, the image Silent Teenagers is juxtaposed to an image, in which ripe, soft plums rest on cold, hard tarmac. They tell us a story of time, fragility and are full of memories.
Julianna, Julianna and Julianna 2021
Unknown Pilots Above the Downtown (Reconstructed) 2022
The Climbing Tree of Childhood (Heikki and Raimo)
2023
Walking with a Friend 2 (Armands and Mateja) 2023
Silent Teenagers (Reconstruction) 2023
Plums on Tarmac 2023
Walking with a Friend (Reconstructed) 2023
A Shared Dream (Exanity -band) 2023
A Class Reunion at a Theatre Foyer 2023
A Dense Moment at the Bridge to the Silk Factory (Reconstructed) 2022
For the past twenty-five years, I have taken a single photograph each day, marking its surface with a personal or world-political event that occurred on that very day.
Silomäki followed a set of personally developed rules when photographing My Weather Diaries: one photo every day, no tripods, no lighting tricks, and nocconscious arrangement. The picture has to come about along with the rest of daily life, as mechanically as possible. The goal is to refrain from conscious content creation and to let the meaning of the images develop freely in time. The significance lies in the image’s relationship with time, if it is to manifest at all. The photographs are accompanied by writings on subjects ranging from contemporary global news to intimate, inner experiences. As the news cycle and his personal life intertwine, geographical distances lose their meaning. When the project began, the weather was not a politically charged issue. In our time, every atmospheric change is seen through the lens of the climate crisis.
2001 –2005
The archipelago of Pori, I am in love. Today there is an environmental conference in Bonn: The Kyoto Protocol is ready to be ratified.
Finlandia hall, three hours after the collapse of the World Trade Center.
Turku, the day that US began bombing Afghanistan.
Helsinki, the day that six million people around the world were demonstrating against the Iraqi War.
Today Anu asked me what I want from life in the future. I couldn’t answer.
The night between Christmas Day and Boxing Day in Kuivasjärvi. At the same time a tsunami is traveling toward the beaches in Southeast Asia.
2005 –2010
10 001
The economic downturn in Europe can be seen in the media, not in the streets.
Anniversary of the October Revolution.
A young man shot nine people today in Jokela school.
I wake up to a text message: ‘Michael Jackson has died’. I take a shower, eat breakfast and check the thermometer: Summer has arrived.
2010 –2015
Malmi. I am in the park with Anu and Leinu. It is the Arab Spring.
Warm July evening at Lake Kuivasjärvi.
A moment ago a Malaysian airline flight MH-17 was shot down in the East Ukraine.
My friend and I listened to 171 Eurovision song contest entries on a car trip from Opole to Budapest. ‘Poupee de cire, poupe’e de son’ by Serge Gainsbourg was playing in the background when this lonely elephant suddenly appeared in front of us in a mountain village in Slovakia.
2015 –2020
Veliky Novgorod on the day that Nelson Mandela died.
The # metoo is speading in social media.
Budapest! Trump and Putin are meeting today in Helsinki.
2020 –2025
I returned to Helsinki from the cottage after the news blackout. Three days earlier, Hamas had launched a massive attack on Israel, firing thousands of rockets and sending fighters across the border. In response, Israel had launched extensive airstrikes in Gaza. I look up from my phone screen and stare out the window for a moment.
At a hotel in Turku. I woke up early in the morning to check the results of the United States presidential election.
I convey the stories of those who have moved across social classes, through perspectives of their own choosing.
Swift and total wealth accumulation is a 21st century phenomenon in the developing world. Jari Silomäki says that people who have experienced upward class mobility have been underrepresented in the documentary arts. As a result, he says, the way such people are depicted in popular culture is often very one-sided: saturated with capitalism and the worship of money. The story of Anita inspired Silomäki to tackle the subject, and he became acquainted with the experiences of upwardly mobile people from seven different countries.
In his film, Jari Silomäki tells the story of a man whose home is invisible in the eyes of society. The protagonist, a man named Miklos living on Budapest’s Hármashatár-hegy mountain, appears to exist outside of the social order, even though he also has strong ties to the political history of Hungary. Prime minister Orbán’s government criminalized homelessness in 2018. A constitutional amendment prohibited sleeping in parks and sanctioned penalties against offenders of the new law. Miklos became an outlaw.
Miklos had lived a quiet life in his tarp-covered home since 2009. He sold the homeless people’s magazine Fedel Nelkul on the street, collected firewood for his outdoor stove, and followed the news on the radio. His relationship with his millionaire neighbors in the Buda Hills was amiable. After the prohibition, peace was replaced with insecurity.
Silomäki met Miklos in 2017 and followed his life for the next year and a half. The film emphasizes the home as a safe haven, even if it is a hovel built from spare wood with no lock on the door.
In 2005 I bought from a flea market in Vallila, Helsinki, the written chattels of an
unknown woman. As I studied the material over the years her life and persona began
to open to me. I made a portrait of her to my series ‘Alienation Stories 2009’. This
reconstructed portrait had lots of inherent deficiencies and I never finished it.
However, it was a catalyst for a much more detailed project, ‘Atlas of Emotions’.
Many things have I witnessed through
this window. Faithfully it has reflected everything back:
the road sign, fallen along the roadside,
looks of the road users,
an invader’s march, the nails struck
though palms,
the noble family, the cold war, a singing
boy, banking crisis, yearning eyes,
acid rain, the intoxicating flesh,
the dense silence, cries of pain,
aimless rushing about, an injured knee,
monuments, natural phenomena,
insecurities, the rising sea level,
stovepipes forever dead now, retaliation on generation
after generation, uninvited guests,
the cellar door,
the missile crisis in Cuba,
travels long as light years, the birch-lined alleyway,
the unstable cradle, the low altar.
the wooden boats burned in Midsummer bonfires,
rebuilding, the stones skipped on water,
the mute mouth of my gentle father
the swollen rowan berries
the drunken birds
hay poles and diesel engines
the pink dress, blooming willowherb
the demonstrations, noise, contempt
the pared- down dreams, longing, all the evenings
the touch of my coarse husband
lingering pleasure
aircraft carriers,
the water which tastes of iron
full stomachs,
empty stomachs,
the salty taste of many tongues
building the Wall
breaking of the Wall
liberation of Nelson Mandela
the broken dishes and the radio static
the Vietnam war, the thrown rice on Church steps,
blossoms and withered flowers,
my grandmother’s bath robe,
the long Sundays, the ersatz coffee
attractive bodies, suicide bombers,
the sunflower- patterned pants, four-o-clock rush hour
full moons
half moons
the unexpected homecomings
when Anna the neighbour’s cervix dilated giving birth
the insults, the proposals of marriage
the broken bridge of Haapamäki
the table settings
the smell of wet peat, the cry of my firstborn
questioning my faith
the sudden movements of my attention- seeking sister
I reconstruct the narratives of anonymous individuals from online discussion forums, using actors as my medium.
In Atlas of Emotions, Jari Silomäki investigates the turning points in the lives of people who post on internet discussion forums from behind their alter-ego screen names. Silomäki went deep into the archives of the internet, spending hundreds of hours searching for the writings of anonymous people from around the world.
Silomäki strives to present some central strain in each writer’s life, and to repeat the feelings and events of the original post as accurately as possible. Silomäki edited the internet posts together into a manuscript and staged the authors’ homes in his studio, based on clues in the texts themselves. Actors then interpreted the reimagined scenes.
The writings on the surface of the work are extracts from the lives of anonymous people, in their own native languages. Sílomäki has blurred, altered, and edited some details to protect the identities of the writers. The work transports the viewer from the general to the specific and private: people’s fears, desires, and dreams. It is important to Silomäki to expand the concept of a documentary and to globally record events and emotions of our times.
Making of Pseudonym Agnieszka85Making of Pseudonym AngervoMaking of Pseudonym MansMaiklMaking of Pseudonym MarianSXMaking of Pseudonym Allein123Making of Pseudonym Allein123
PseudonymRose
PseudonymArmeijakaveri
“ My army buddy is a masculine man, tall and handsome, full of attraction. I have seen women show interest before he said a word. When the man starts a conversation, the woman is sold right away. And not just any woman, but a smart and beautiful older woman. When my army buddy has sex, it’s not an experiment. He hasn’t taken anyone’s virginity and he never cheated on his partner.
In the army, he took care of the others, including me. He told clever stories. He’s smart, but not in the way people with university education are smart. My army buddy knows the practical stuff; he can make and repair all sorts of things. He has leadership qualities, reasoning, and problem-solving abilities. I’ve never met anyone like him before.
With my army buddy, what matters is what I want to be. Other people’s attitudes depend on how we appear in their eyes. Theo Fleury, the best man ever to play for the Calgary Flames, has ruined two marriages, his finances, and his health. Ice hockey is the only thing he has. And he doesn’t really have that anymore. Theo has won the Stanley Cup, led the player statistics, and broken NHL records. He’s a beloved player that I will appreciate forever.”
PseudonymMiinasofia2
“ I fell off a horse and was too afraid to get back up on it. I rode a bike back home and closed myself in my room. Pink’s ‘Please Don’t Leave Me’ was playing on the radio.”
Pseudonym来小姐
“ He asked me: ‘What are you feeling now?’ I told him I didn’t feel anything. He said he looked down upon me. I said that was his business.
It was raining outside. I walked into a little restaurant that serves breakfast and chatted with the owner. She asked me something private, like what my husband does for a living, how much money my husband gives me every month, and so on. Honestly, I didn’t like these questions, but I answered them all patiently. I was haunted by loneliness.”
PseudonymAgnieszka85
“ I was seventeen years old, blinded by love, and pregnant. Half a year later, Cibor offered me his mother’s ring while walking in the street. He was seven years older than I was. My parents held a modest reception for the relatives. All was well, until my newly wedded husband said he wouldn’t be staying for the night. He was going home to his mother.
I lived with my parents, but my husband was with me when I went to give birth. The midwife praised him: ‘He held the baby so gently, and he cried.’ As we came back from the hospital, I found out our new address. The baby would sleep with Cibor’s mother and aunt, in their room. I would move into the extended kitchen with my husband.
When Martha got sick, I couldn’t go to her. My mother-in-law was tired, but still wanted to care for the child alone. If I tried to go for a walk with my daughter, my mother-in-law announced that she would take the child out. I could take care of my own business. I said no. They called me ungrateful.
I was an idle burden, an extra mouth to feed. The door to my child was locked in front of my eyes. I applied for jobs; I attended courses. I met people who taught me to be selfish. And that was how I acted, to get out of that sick house.”
PseudonymVilles
“ So, I got an annual membership at a gym. Immediately I got hooked on the clunking of the free weights, the energetic background music, and those moments when I repeated the movements like a machine. A cold shower, clean clothes, and a recovery drink afterward became my greatest pleasures. On the way back home, it made my day when my legs buckled on the stairs. This is how I lost my faith. I was the last of my siblings to believe in Jesus until adulthood.”
PseudonymAngervo
“ Yesterday was my youngest cat’s birthday and all its friends were able to come. In the evening I watched a recording of the royal wedding of Princess Victoria and Daniel. I had a dream about painting, kissing, and falling in love.”
PseudonymInkoo84
“ It was a clear summer night in 1984. I felt a presence in my room. A sweater fell off the edge of the closet. I said the Our Father prayer. I clicked the night light on. In the morning my mom asked if the sound at night woke me up.”
I have walked at the sites of twentieth-century political tragedies, taking as many steps as there were lives lost in each event.
The starting point of Jari Silomäki’s project is Joseph Beuys’s life-size image We Are the Revolution (1972), in which Beuys strides confidently toward the viewer, suggesting that together we might form a revolution. While Beuys believed art could change society, Silomäki reverses this idea by following individuals who became subjects of history rather than its masters.
Since 2006, he has walked at political murder sites of the 20th century, taking as many steps as there were victims of each tragedy—from the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo to Ground Zero in New York. Between these two events lie tens of millions of steps, forming what he describes as the beginning of a “long, impossible project.”
In We Are the Revolution, after Joseph Beuys, Silomäki explores how the individual relates to vast forces such as war, statistics, and centuries of history, portraying the individual as an inevitably solitary part of the historical whole.
I take two steps on the corner of Obala Kulina bana & Zelenih beretki in SarajevoI take 17,000 steps on the Marco Polo Bridge in BeijingI take 300,000 steps in NanjingI take 237,000 steps on the coast of NormandyI take hundreds of steps in the forest next to Pindush village in KareliaI take 200,000 steps along the White Sea Canal in KareliaI take 3,669 steps in front of the Radio building in BudapestI walk on the edge of Dealey Plaza in Dallas I walk on a balcony of the Lorraine Motel in MemphisI walk in front of the Audubon Ballroom in Harlem, New YorkI take thousands of steps in Tiananmen Square in BeijingI take 8,100 steps in SrebrenicaI take 45 steps in Račak village, KosovoI take 92 steps on Guryanova Street in Moscow
Installation view, Gallery Korjaamo, Helsinki, Finland Installation view, Museum of Contemporary Art Kiasma, Helsinki, Finland
I have photographed European cities employing the aesthetics of war and violence.
Ordinary towns on ordinary days is a photographic series of European cities captured through the aesthetics of war photography. Silomäki photographs people, landscapes, and buildings with a predetermined attitude, employing the visual form of violence and war, thereby rendering ordinary, everyday situations as if they were chaos on a conflict zone
I examine the outsider’s experience of war and photography’s complex relationship to it as a documentary medium.
Personal War Stories of an Outsider constitutes a collage of images through which Silomäki examines his mediated relationship to war. For him, warfare is experienced only at a distance, as he lacks any direct participation in it. The work thus articulates the sensibility of a generation for whom war appears geographically and experientially remote, yet simultaneously omnipresent through its incessant circulation in the media. In this way, Silomäki underscores how the phenomenon of war imposes itself upon contemporary subjectivity, compelling each individual to confront it and to assume a position in relation to it.
Upon closer scrutiny, the central concern of Silomäki’s practice does not reside in violence per se, but in the existential and ethical dilemmas that emerge when an individual encounters realities that remain fundamentally opaque or incomprehensible. His work therefore shifts the discourse from the spectacle of conflict toward the phenomenology of human response and the limits of understanding.
From a formal perspective, the project unfolds in two distinct yet interrelated sequences. In the first, Silomäki photographs the night sky and bullet-scarred walls in war zones, tracing imagined constellations in the perforations left by gunfire. This gesture transforms the residue of violence into a cosmological field, suggesting both fragility and transcendence. In the second, the artist himself appears before the viewer, revealing his face and entering the stage only after the violence has subsided. These latter images evoke theatricality, as Silomäki inhabits the scenes as though they were cinematic or Hollywood stage sets. This strategy situates the work within the broader discourse of post-documentary practice: while grounded in the evidentiary traces of conflict, the images also foreground mediation, staging, and fictionality. Rather than offering transparent testimony, Silomäki interrogates the very conditions under which war can be represented, thereby complicating the viewer’s expectations of photography as a documentary medium.
Installation view, Galleria Galica, Milan, Italy.
Picnic on a mountain. We imagine ourselves to be guerrillas.
I am walking on a minefield for aesthetic purposes.
Ruins of homes after hotel breakfast.
The wall is riddled with bullet holes. I fell one with chewing gum.
I have collected letters written by anonymous individuals during the pivotal days of the last century.
One of the central themes in Jari Silomäki’s art is the place of the individual in the history of his own time. For this work, he gathered anonymous ordinary people’s texts, which were written at the time of significant historical events: the murder of Franz Ferdinand, the Kristallnacht, the Cuban Missile Crisis, Neil Armstrong landing on the moon, the Fall of the Berlin Wall, September 11, etc. In addition to the text collage, the installation also includes a 16 mm film, featuring iconic images from 20th-century history, which he projects on the bare hunched back of an old man.
The U-2 flight revealed that the Soviet Union was constructing a missile base in Cuba. The world was at the brink of a nuclear war. Sirkka was moved:” There is my darling, over there/ yon the ocean. Oh, why don’t you come, oh woe/ I knew that you’d go, oh oh oh.”
The uprising began in the ghetto of Warsaw. On the same day, Viljo cursed the authorities:” Took away my higher benefits class. I’m getting a medical certificate about my heart condition. They have to pay me my benefits. No way will I eat this mess they keep offering not even if I have to pawn all of my things to pay for it.”
Juan Peron was overthrown in Argentine. Helmi finished a postcard written to her friend saying: ” The apples have grown big and there are lots of them, also in the wild apple tree.”
The uprising began in the ghetto of Warsaw. On the same day, Viljo cursed the authorities:” Took away my higher benefits class. I’m getting a medical certificate about my heart condition. They have to pay me my benefits. No way will I eat this mess they keep offering not even if I have to pawn all of my things to pay for it.”
Two Palestinian terrorists hijacked a Lufthansa Boeing 727 en route from Damascus to Frankfurt. Eila wrote:” The east wind is now getting cold. Must start wearing the fur hat soon. Tapani has a slight cough. That is to say, he coughs sometimes, not always, at night. Spent the weekend in Järvenpää. I left on Saturday morning at 11 and returned on Sunday half five in the evening. Closed my eyes. No news, no new developments.”
John F. Kennedy was murdered in Dallas. On the same day Aatto wrote:” I’m surprised myself to be alive. But this depends ( damn it all) on many things… My Danish ( heart symbol) left last Saturday ( tear symbol).Trisesse… You see, everything got OK before she left.(s’pose) Wa-wa-woom, boy, we really had some fantastic nights…”
Guerillas hijacked an Olympic Airlines flight at Athens airport. At the same time Sari wrote in a postcard:” Marja visited me today, I am so happy about her visit. She leaves tomorrow for Helsinki for two weeks.”
The Apollo 11 landed on the moon. Eila wrote:”Tapani has his first loose tooth in his lower jaw. He doesn’t like it at all, almost cried when he noticed it.”
The Allied troops beached in Normandy. On the same day Reino wrote home from the Finnish front:”Everything is remains the same. More small fights with the neighbor, but he has pulled the short straw almost every time… You wouldn’t believe what my ”dining hall” looks like after two weeks without toothpaste.”
Soviet tanks rolled down the streets of Prague. At the same time, Eila wrote:” I haven’t done any gardening even if it is autumn, and likely will no be doing anything. I don’t know if it is better to sell the house and the find an apartment, or to try and trade. A boatload of big questions for me to think over.”
The Iranian hostage crisis begun. On the day Helena wrote:”I’m sitting in Jarmo’s room in Puistola and am listening to music. It’s cosy here and I feel so much love. Jarmo is out, that is, in the garage fixing his car.”
When the Soviet tanks drove to Moscow parliament building, Johanna wrote to her friend:” Just came back from a two-week holiday. My life has its ups and downs, like waves. There are gray and dark times and then luckily happy days.”
It is the opening ceremony of the Berlin Olympics. An unknown woman writes from Somero:” Grandpa has been at the old saw today. An I have been helping everyone here and there. I have collected hayseeds, been at the fields. Did not help with the treshing. Made good food with lots of care and heated the sauna so hot, that the benches would burn you unless you threw some water on them first. I have been ever so busy. I’m not fit to work outdoors. The hot sun makes me sick. The sun will be the death of me, but then I will not freeze in Malmi. I have been sleeping so far in the storehouse and as you know there is a cross draft.”
The Guatemalan president Jacobo Arbenz Guzmán was overthrown in a military coup orchestrated by the CIA. An anonymous writer scribbled beneath the date 27.6. 1954.” It rains often here and the weather is very changeable. We often hear that there is a low pressure front moving in from the British isles – we think it must be the same as over there.We are busy painting and fixing up the kitchen. Mother will paint the sauna windowsills and the doors, then everything will be neat. We will try to get a swing on the lower patio.”
The Mexican revolutionary general Pancho Villa was murdered. On the same day Miss J writes: ”Sweetest summer greetings from the heart of nature. I have enjoyed today to the fullest. In the morning we went to the pond, and A. and E. swam. I had a towel, washed my feet and sunbathed my whole body. Afterwards, we had breakfast and took the motor boat to an island and had coffee there. On the island we sunbathed some more so that every bit of bare skin turned red. Oh, it was sweet to run on the smooth rocks and barefoot on the sand. On the way home we were caught in a downpour, but it was quite romanic to be there in a raincoat.”
The Soviet fighter pilot Viktor Belenko landed in Hokkaido, Japan and sought political asylum from the USA. At the same time Maija sent a postcard to her family:” It is warm here, about + 30 to + 35 degrees Celsius, maybe more. The air is dry, the land harsh, but quite attractive. Living with two wild cats and an americano is tolerable – even fun at times.”
Demonstrations against Slobodan Milosevic broke out in Belgrad. On that day, Vappu sent a postcard from the USA:” Dear mother, I’m writing from this side of the border for a change. We are in Nevada, in a state park camping site. It is free, so there is no telephone here. It is thirteen miles to the nearest village to post this. John will take the postcard there (by moped).”
Princess Diana was in a car accident in Paris. An unknown writes from Germany:” The family is healthy ( Sara is staying home from kindergarten because of a stomach bug) It is making the rounds. We are about to come to Finland, and the girls really should go posthaste.”
The battle of Belleau forest in the First World War. On the same day Wilho attached a note:” If you have well strong work-cart wheels with axles, I ask you to despatch me one on my note.”
The Japanese troops took Manila. On that day Aino wrote:” A healthy girl was born near two in the morning, so Kaarina is now a big sister – she is exactly 3 y 5 mos older than the new daughter. It was a happy reunion.”
ugoslavia was declared a socialist republic and Josip Broz Tito its president. On that day Atto wrote to his friend:” This company does not interest me but royally pisses me off. Not very interested in my ‘studies’. Whatever. S.A. is never going to benefit from me because as I have said before: I’m gonna leave this damn country as fast as possible. And VIRVE ma vie, as I wanna it t’be. All is emptiness.” “
Israel occupied the West bank, Gaza and Golan. The Six Days war began. Eila wrote in Helsinki, dated 5th June 1967:” The weather is not very fair, expect it’ll get better. Aunt Annikki asked me to visit, again. Should I go. I really do not want to go. It is always nice there, once you get there. We’ll see. Haven’t finished the sheets. Should get started on those. Oh, and Tapani asked this morning, when are we going to go to Mikkeli on the motor boat.”
Nelson Mandela gave his speech I Am Prepared to Die at the beginning of the Rivonia trial. On that day Liisa wrote:” I wear the new hat and have gotten used to it. The girl is fine now. I don’t need anything to settle my coffee. The girl went to the eye doctor. Don’t need glasses.”
The army crushed an attempted coup in Togo. Eila wrote:” The old man ran his car off the road and into a field, when the rear tyre blew. The car is a wreck and he has broken some ribs. Had anyone been sitting beside the driver – they would certainly have died. I am afraid that something bad will happen before it is all clear. I phone there every week. There is a phone booth in Laajasalo where you can talk as long as you like for 20 p.”
The Hungarian uprising against the Communist regime reached its apex when 50 000 students and workers marched to the Parliament building. On the same day Simo wrote to this friend in Käpylä, Helsinki:” All of my nice pictures of Mars and my writing were ruined because I had not glued down the edges by accident. Jukka tore them apart. But I will begin again and collect also other pictures from space. Have you heard that Kalle’s bicycle has been stolen?”
16 mm film Duration: 08 min. 46 sec. Sound & design: Joni Virtanen Cameraoperator: Veli Granö Cast: Esko Puustinen Financial support: Avek and Alfred Kordelin Fundation
An autofictional study of youthful uncertainty, with photography as a tool for self-discovery.
Rehearsals for Adulthood is a photographic essay on a painful process of growing up, in which a young man’s struggle with ideology, identity and corporeality forms the central narrative. Silomäki weaves personal experiences, memories, and imaginations into a visual narration that recalls the narrative structures of literature and cinema. His work belongs to the post-documentary tradition of photography, where documentary, fiction, and personal storytelling intersect. At the same time, as a man recounting the emotional stories of everyday life, Silomäki unsettles the very foundations of the tradition of masculine art.
If she sits here and Paavo, the loudest boy in the class sits here. Then I’ll seat myself here.
She passes by right here on Monday at 11.45hrs towards the reading room. I’ll place myself here, in front of the poetry section.
The Dreamer, after Man Ray
The feeling of joy has never been stronger that my fear of its loss.
I closed my eyes imagine I’d been at the sea my hole life, opened my eyes.
I have photographed my grandmother in the months following my grandfather’s death.
In She Cannot Wear Red, Jari Silomäki reflects on his grandmother’s life in the wake of his grandfather’s death. The work cannot be seen merely as a portrayal of mourning; rather, it reveals a paradox of absence. Once the grandfather is no longer physically present, his presence deepens—his figure becomes more vivid, his influence more pervasive, until he seems to fill the entire space.
There’s it’s now stalking, and a wagtail
of all things. The poor thing’s just came
back to Finland; it should stalk those that don’t migrate.
“Mind the Step” is an artist’s attempt to deal with one of the most devastating man-made tragedies of the twentieth century — the Soviet Gulag. In contrast to literature, this subject has almost no presence in visual art produced during either the Soviet or post-Soviet period. When there were visual records, they largely came from those who passed through the Gulag. Whatever the reasons for this jarring lacuna, Russia did not have its own Anselm Kiefer, who could confront his country’s dark past in an artistically powerful way, although the Gulag destroyed several millions of innocent human lives. While addressing the subject cannot do enough justice to the atrocities, every attempt to do so is still necessary especially in light of the disturbing rise of Stalinist admirers in contemporary Russia. With its somewhat imperative and inviting title, Jari Silomaki’s project “Mind the Step” is one possible way to deal with the tragedy. In a personal and empathic way, Silomaki offers a reflection on the catastrophe from the perspective of the neighboring country, Finland, whose people also became victims of the events. The artist’s core performative gesture is rather minimalistic in character and symbolically unrealistic in scale: to make one step for each known or unnamed victim lying in mass graves, while visiting the original sites of the massacre. The Mind the Step builds on and significantly expands the artist’s previous project, series of photographs “We Are the Revolution” (2006–2013), which is now part of the KIASMA collection. The project will employ various documenting media, including video, photography, text and sound, and its different conceptual parts will be presented in Finland and Russia between 2018–2022. Andrey Shabanov
Site-specific installation consists of two large-scale glass panes made in opposite colours: filtering out each other and creating a grey area when looked through from either side.
The work varies according to the direction of light and viewing, creating different combinations of color, shape, and gray area. The gray areas form an intermediate space – where two elements cancel each other out and appear as one. In other words, the grass is always gray on the other side of the fence – regardless of the side. The work depicts the contractual concept of a border by means of abstraction.
– Located at the Headquarters of the Southeast Finland Border Guard District. – Tempered glass – 400cm x 240cm x 70cm
“Mind the Step” is an artist’s attempt to deal with one of the most devastating man-made tragedies of the twentieth century – the Soviet Gulag. In contrast to literature, this subject has almost no presence in visual art produced during either the Soviet or post-Soviet period. When there were visual records, they largely came from those who passed through the Gulag. Whatever the reasons for this jarring lacuna, Russia did not have its own Anselm Kiefer, who could confront his country’s dark past in an artistically powerful way, although the Gulag destroyed several millions of innocent human lives. While addressing the subject cannot do enough justice to the atrocities, every attempt to do so is still necessary especially in light of the disturbing rise of Stalinist admirers in contemporary Russia. With its somewhat imperative and inviting title, Jari Silomaki’s project “Mind the Step” is one possible way to deal with the tragedy. In a personal and empathic way, Silomaki offers a reflection on the catastrophe from the perspective of the neighboring country, Finland, whose people also became victims of the events. The artist’s core performative gesture is rather minimalistic in character and symbolically unrealistic in scale: to make one step for each known or unnamed victim lying in mass graves, while visiting the original sites of the massacre. The Mind the Step builds on and significantly expands the artist’s previous project, series of photographs “We Are the Revolution” (2008–2013), which is now part of the KIASMA collection. The project will employ various documenting media, including video, photography, text and sound, and its different conceptual parts will be presented in Finland and Russia between 2018–2022. –Andrey Shabanov
