Interview: The Central Finland Exhibition 2020

Keskisuomalainen (Regional Newspaper) 07.10.18

Provinssien prinssi katsoo ulkopuolelta

Vuoden 2020 suurkatselmus käsittelee keski-suomen näkökulmasta johonkin kuulumista ja kuulumattomuutta.

Jyväskylä

Riikka Mahlamäki-Kaistinen

“Provinssien prinssi, siksi kollegat minua kutsuvat”, kuraattori Rickard Borgström nauraa ja hörppää teetä Jyväskylän taidemuseon aulassa.

Lievästä jetlagista kärsivä mies on saapunut hetki sitten Kanadan Montrealista. Viimeiset pari vuotta hän on asunut Gröönlannissa. Suvun juuret ovat Ruotsissa ja Suomessa. Tanssin, teatterin ja nykytaiteen parissa työskentelevä Borgström kuratoi tapahtumia, seminaareja ja näyttelyitä pääasiassa Pohjoismaissa – ja usein perifeerisillä alueilla.

Borgströmin tausta ja liikkuva työ sopivat hyvin tekeillä olevan näyttelyn teemaan. Vuonna 2020 järjestettävän keskisuomalaisen nykytaiteen suurkatselmuksen teemana on nimittäin tarkastella paikkaa ja siihen kuulumista tai kuulumattomuutta.

– Muuttaminen on jo tämän sisällissotien aiheuttaman maahanmuutonkin kautta hyvin ajankohtainen aihe nykypäivänä. On kiinnostavaa miten ihminen luo tämän jatkuvan muutoksen keskellä kuulumisen tunteen, Borgström pohtii.

Kun uniikkeja, omia paikkoja ei ole, niiden merkitys häviää tai ainakin muuttuu.

– Ehkä identiteettiä alkaa tällöin määrittää pikemminkin kuulumattomuus, kuin kuuluminen. Ja ehkä koko kysymys kuulumisesta on pohjimmiltaan epärelevantti, hän sanoo.

Kun vastaava taiteen suurkatselmus järjestettiin taidemuseolla 2015, lähtökohtana oli, että taiteilijat ovat keskisuomalaisia, tai heillä on ainakin keskisuomalaiset juuret. Museon intendentti Leena Lokka sanoo tulevan näyttelynkin teeman olleen aluksi konkreettisemmin aluetta koskeva.

– Kun Rickard valittiin taiteilijaseuran puolesta kuraattoriksi, hän avasi teemaa laajemmalle. Tuntui oikeastaan helpottavalta, että teemaa ei sidottu enää maantieteellisiin rajoihin.

Käytännössä tämä tarkoittaa sitä, että näyttelyyn hakevilla taiteilijoilla ei tarvitse välttämättä olla edes aiempia siteitä Keski-Suomeen.

– Ymmärrys johonkin paikkaan kuulumisesta supistuu jos sitä ajatellaan vain elinympäristön kautta. Kuuluminen voi syntyä sitäkin kautta, että taiteilija tulee tänne toteuttamaan teemaan liittyvää työtään. Paikka ja siihen kuuluminen avautuvat silloin työn kautta. On mielenkiintoista nähdä millaisia tulkintoja tämä synnyttää, Borgström sanoo.

Kuraattorille itselleen Jyväskylä on tuttu vuodesta 2006. Hän kuratoi silloin museolla pohjoismaista taideprojektia.

Matkalla maan keskipisteeseen 2020 -näyttely toteutetaan yhdessä taiteilijaseuran, Jyväskylän taidemuseon, Keuruun ja Saarijärven museoiden kanssa. Taiteilijahaku umpeutuu kuun lopussa. Borgström sanoo, että mukaan kaivataan niin ammattilaisia, harrastajia kuin itseoppineitakin taiteilijoita.

– Olemme hyvin avoimia. Toivon mukaan töitä sekä perinteisiltä taiteen aloilta että kokeellisempiakin töitä. Mukaan otetaan sekä vanhoja että uusia töitä.

Mukaan voi hakea pelkällä ideallakin. Näyttely rakentuu taiteilijoiden ja kuraattorin keskinäisen dialogin kautta.

– Tiesimme Borgströmin hyvin keskustelevaksi kuraattoriksi, joten hän sopi siksikin hyvin tehtävään, Lokka sanoo.

Intendentti Jukka Partanen pitää hyvänä, että kuraattori ei ole paikkakuntalainen.

– On kiinnostavaa nähdä miltä alue näyttäytyy kun sitä katsoo kokonaan ulkopuolinen kuraattori.

Suomenruotsalaisen Borgström kotikieli on ruotsi, vaikka hän jonkun verran suomea ymmärtääkin. Taiteilijoiden ja kuraattorin yhteistyö toteutetaan englanniksi ja taiteilijaseura on luvannut auttaa, jos kielimuureja syntyy.

– Ja lopulta se tärkein kielihän tässä on kuitenkin taiteen kieli. Se e ei tarvitse tulkkausta, Partanen sanoo.

kuvateksti: “Suomi on hyvin keskittynyt maa ja Helsinki-painottunut, mutta jos menet Ateneumiin näet tauluissa paljon keskisuomalaista maisemaa”. Rickard Borgström sanoo. Siihen hän ei osaa vielä vastata minkälaisena keskisuomalainen nykytaide ilmenee, mutta lupaa vastauksen vuonna 2020 näyttelyn avajaisissa.

Find the Article and Pics HERE
Written by Riikka Mahlamäki–Kaistinen

What kind of expectations do you have concerning the project?

I hope we will see an inter-generational exhibition, with strong new, as much as old, works and projects, reflecting on the place and the production of art, with local and international artists. I’m also very curious to take part of the artists’ proposals and develop the exhibition with them and introduce it to the public of the summer

of 2020.

What does the theme mean to you?

Well, we just started, and we are waiting for the artists’ interpretation and proposal around place, so it would be too early to state a specific definition of the theme. However, I find it interesting that artists and curators are asked to produce work for places, often so, without a clue of the context. It makes me wonder

how you as an artist or curator approach and produce work in relation to a place that you are displaced from? And what does it mean to produce work for the place you belong to? Is art something placeless, within us? Or is it precisely the place that shapes the production of art?

As we think of the artists and curators working in one places after the other, they become a symbolic figure of the hypermobility in our society today, where we by will or force are deemed to migrate, so I think we can discuss belonging and displacement in a broader cultural context today as well. Having that said, we are developing works and the framework of the exhibition for the coming months, thereafter the theme will be more precisely defined.

Why it is important to open the call for local artists and artists living in other regions in Finland and abroad?

Well, the notion of belonging was introduced to me from the organizers, and I thought it was a rather urgent topic to think about, as I feel we are less bound to places, and we are rather displaced, that being displaced is our modus operandi, in our soul, body and identity. So the question of belonging is contested in today’s world, that is in flux, therefore I find it hard to argue that exhibition should be closed to only artists in the region, it would reduce our understanding of place and belonging.

What kind of memories do you have from the year 2006 when you were curating the More Than This exhibition in Jyväskylä?

It was a rather overwhelming experience. It was one of my early exhibitions, and all the works were more or less commissioned, so we little did we know how it would turn out. That excitement, I will not forget. Besides that, I met such a professional team, with in-depth knowledge and the very supportive curator Leena Looka and the former director Paivimarjut Raippalinna. I met an engaged artists community with artists like Anna Ruth and Jussive Heikkilä. Therefore I’m humbled and honored to been invited to return to work in Jyväskylä with the artistic community of the region.

Open Call for The Central Finland Exhibition 2020

Screen Shot 2018-08-05 at 17.38.47 Friends and colleagues, I pass on another Call for The Central Finland Exhibition 2020, Notions of place – from belonging to displaced.

If you have the interest to present existing work, adaptations or new work in relation to place, from any discipline really, feel welcome to apply.

And please share among those who you think are interested.

Check https://matkalla2020haku.keskisuomentaide.fi to apply and more information.

Don´t be a stranger, if you have any questions contact me. Thank you!

OPEN CALL: The Central Finland Exhibition 2020, Notions of place – from belonging to displaced

Open Call for ideas for new works and/or existing works and/or adaptations of existing works. It is open for locally based artists and artist groups as well as artists from the rest of Finland and abroad, from any art discipline.

Entry Deadline: October 31, 2018
Accepted Artist Notification: January 31, 2019

This regional exhibition will take a closer look at notions of place – from belonging to displacement. The concept is as simple as complex, and left open to many interpretations and approaches.

We, therefore, seek for artists from the region, the rest of Finland and abroad, and from any discipline, who are particularly interested in generating objects and activities surrounding notions of “place”, from the personal to the political and the planetary.

We are calling for new works and/or existing works and/or adaptations of existing works. Proposals can occupy multiple contexts, in any scale. All approaches, strategies as media are welcome, including but not limited to painting, drawing, sculpture, video, sound, performance, intervention and installation etc.

The framework of the exhibition is developed in dialogue with the selected artists and the curator. The framework engages in the individual artist’s practice, and it is invested in current debates around place- orientated practices, their modes of production, their methods, their working processes, materiality and critical potential. Further, it is informed by a broader discussion on how cultures of belonging and displacement are shaped in a fast-changing global situation.

Check the link to apply and for more information and conditions.

https://matkalla2020haku.keskisuomentaide.fi

*There is an application fee, it´s sort of a standard in the Finnish art system. The fee is allocated to The Central Finnish Artist´s Association´s regular work, so at least it supports the infrastructure for contemporary art. Hope it doesn´t avert your consideration.

Image: Dan Perjovschi 2018

Curator for The Central Finland Exhibition 2020

Notions of place- from belonging to displaced.

This regional exhibition will look closer at notions of place. The concept is open for many interpretations and approaches, as it is as simple, as complex.

Current institutional structures distribute productions towards sites, places, and contexts through commissions and open calls, where often the artists find themselves dislocated from the site, place and context.

What artistic methods and working processes are there to be found in these boundless place orientated practices? Are the works aimed for a local environment and/or conceived for a global scene? What does this type of art produce on the local level?

Furthermore, these questions draw one to think more broadly around cultures of belonging and displacement today.

The call is thus open for locally based artists as much as artists from the rest of Finland and abroad, from any art discipline.

The Call is for ideas for new works and/or existing works and/or previous works.

The Central Finland Exhibition is dived into two chapters: The first chapter opens in June 2020 and the second, September 2020. It is organized by Jyväskylä Art Museum, Keuruu Museum, Saarijärvi Museum and Jyväskylä Artists’ Association.

The call will be finalized and published the coming week.

Who is Eligible to apply?

The Open Call prioritizes artists from any art discipline who address notions of place within their work.
The Open Call prioritizes applications that respond to the questions around art production in relation to place.
Those working as individuals, artistic teams and collectives are eligible.
To apply you do not need to have an art education or to have studied in university.
Those who are currently attending any full-time education are not eligible for The Open Call.

Click the following for information about the former edition

English

Finnish

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Come Dance With Me

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This fall I’m invited to teach during the course CHOREOGRAPHING CONTEXTS at DOCH- STHLM, among great people such as Sandra Noeth, Kerstin Schroth, Agnes Quackels.

Thanks to the invitation from the superb Course Director: Anna Efraimsson

Deadline to Apply 15th of April

CHOREOGRAPHING CONTEXTS – COURSE

Curating in dance is a field of strong expansion and ongoing definition and redefinition.

In the course, we meet different curatorial and artistic practices especially looking at performing arts and performance. We will analyze curating from structural, social, aesthetic and political perspectives and look at its potential and role in current dance- choreography and performance ecology. This course is approaching curating as an artistic practice departing from a wide definition of choreography. Furthermore, the course Choreographing Contexts aims at supporting the student’s own curatorial practice and methods.

Artists and curators from Sweden and other countries come and share strategies, formats, problems, and opportunities.
For more information press this link

SILA General Assembly 26.03.18

Screen Shot 2018-03-31 at 18.34.42 SILAp ataatsimeersuarnera / SILA General Assembly 26.03.18

BOARD 2018 Naleraq Eugenius Chairman, Kimmernaq Kjeldsen Vice Chairman, Rickard Borgström Secretary & Treasurer, Maliina Jensen Member, Klaus Geisler, Member Substitute Members, Pipaluk K. Jørgensen, AneMarie Ottosen Pilluaritsi!

And tikilluaritsi to our new SILA members Miki Petrussen, Nukakkuluk Kreutzmann

Skärmavbild 2018-01-16 kl. 22.11.52