AARG 2022

Observations and questions about the future of sustainable food production in the context of art

AARG 2022 presented observations and questions about the future of sustainable food production in the context of art and at the same time served as an assembly for the three animal-themed exhibitions: What’s It Like to Be an Animal, Pigs and  Farming presented in Kunsthalle Seinäjoki in 2020-2022. AARG 2022 was held in Kalevan Navetta at the 25th and 26th of August 2022. Recording of the gathering can be watch on the video. Program can be seen from this link.

Moderator was Special Advisor  Susanna Mäki-Oversteyns from The Arts Promotion Centre Finland. Speakers in the gathering were Art Curator Sanna Karimäki-Nuutinen giving presentation on Contemporary Art Exhibition as part of Socio-political Animal and Food Discussions. Documentarist and writerRiikka Kaihovaara talked about Beyond Factory Farming, Associate professor Panu Pihkala was giving a talk in English about Environmental Feelings and Hope,  ISEAS Food Symposium 2022 was held at the same time in the area. Few of the participants came to give Greetings from the symposium. Short introductions from  Artistic Director Katja Juhola: ISEAS, Artist Teemu Mäki: collaboration with Kirjakerho, Artist and philosopher Raisa Foster: Collaboration with Young Farmers and Seinäjoki High School, and Community artist Joan Marie Kelly: Tiistenjoki Elementary School,  Artist Teemu Lehmusruusu presented his artistic project Trophic Verses and CuratorIda Enegren gave a presentation of the artistic program at AARG that she curated. 

AARG is an annual discussion event addressing current themes in contemporary art and the countryside. The program of the Kunsthalle Seinäjoki is based on countryside and issues and phenomena arising from the urban-rural interface.

Moderator of the AARG Seminar
Special Advisor Susanna Mäki-Oversteyns, Arts Promotion Centre Finland

Mäki-Oversteyns has been responsible for the new special grant of Art Promotion Centre Finland. The grant targets the promotion of art and cultural activities in sparsely populated areas. Funding is based on the order of the parliamentary working group for sparsely populated areas to support the development of cultural activities in these areas. Susanna Mäki-Oversteyns has previously worked as the Head of the Culture Unit, The City of Lapua.

Art Curator Sanna Karimäki-Nuutinen
Contemporary Art Exhibition as part of Socio-political Animal and Food Discussions

During the first years of Kaleva Navetta, Kunsthalle Seinäjoki has researched together with artists the significance of animals in contemporary art and society, taking inspiration from the surrounding countryside and the context of their new premises of Kunsthalle Seinäjoki. Karimäki-Nuutinen’s presentation is part of her doctoral research at the University of Jyväskylä. In her research, she examines how the contemporary art exhibitionparticipates in socio-political animal and food discussions in Southern Ostrobothnia. The focus of the examination is especially on the Pigs -exhibition.

Documentarist and writer Riikka Kaihovaara
Beyond Factory Farming

Animal ethics and coexistence after correcting the most blatant grievances. How to be and live in a world where the production of suffering cannot be avoided? Kaihovaaras artistic work has dealt eg. with the past and present of animal production and our disconnection with nature.

Associate professor Panu Pihkala
Environmental Feelings and Hope

What kind of feelings do environmental issues and animal issues evoke? Can you try to face them constructively? Associate Professor of Environmental Theology Panu Pihkala is a leading Finnish expert in research related to environmental anxiety. Pihkala emphasizes the possibilities of arts and culture in dealing with environmental feelings and hope.

Break & exhibition videos

ISEAS Food Symposium 2022
Greetings from the symposium

Artistic Director Katja Juhola: ISEAS
Artist Teemu Mäki: Collaboration with Kirjakerho (book club)
Artist and philosopher Raisa Foster: Collaboration with Young Farmers and Seinäjoki High School
Community artist Joan Marie Kelly: Collaboration with Tiistenjoki Elementary School

The ISEAS Food Symposium will hold four art events in August 2022. Each group works with socially engaged art methods in Lapua or the province. Central to the work is group discussions, which are used to develop, reflect, analyze and create a dialogue between researchers and artists about how art can be used to open up the food theme in local communities. The symposium examines the concept of food in three different teams art and science. Teams are challenged to think about food through broad implications.

Artist Teemu Lehmusruusu
Trophic Verses

Teemu Lehmusruusu lead us to think about our position in the food web and our relationship with the soil through the project Trophic Verses – trans-disciplinary platform. How to make art based on observation of soil phenomena that cannot be directly reached by human senses?

Questions & Conversation

Curator Ida Enegren
Presentation of the artistic program at AARG

Enegren has curated the artistic program to AARG. She is finalizing her master’s degree in exhibition studies at the Praxis-programme in University of the Arts Helsinki, Academy of Fine Arts.

Parallel program

kesäkuu, elokuu
Tuomas Lehtomaa 

2022
Ice cubes and map

Curator Ida Enegren, Production Art University Seinäjoki Unit

kesäkuu, elokuu is a work that consists of melting ice cubes on the roof of Kalevan Navetta and a map wrapped around the publication made to accompany the parallel artistic programme. The work is the sum of thoughts, trials, and experiments that emerged during a two-week working period in Seinäjoki in June. A recipe found online for a drink made from sprouted grains became a central starting point for the work. Lehtomaa’s work is often formed by the relationships between material, space, and body, and the way they position themselves as parts of a wider field of meanings, immediately outside what is perceived. Lehtomaa is interested in artistic work as such, the feelings and thoughts that emerge in different work processes, being with unawareness. The liquid used for the soaking and sprouting experiments was preserved and transported to a freezer warehouse. It will be brought back to melt during the seminar day in August.

Purpose, Scope and Penalties
Asunción Molinos Gordo
2016, Video, 18 min
In the video Purpose, scope and penalties, three farmers and a researcher meet at a local café in Uchisar, Turkey, to drink tea and to discuss factors that impact farming and, in particular, to evaluate the consequences of the controversial seed law that was enacted in 2006. Seed law no. 5553 was carried through at record speed without the opportunity for citizens, farmers, or scientists to comment on it. The law regulates the production and selling of seeds and aims to restructure the seed sector to increase productivity and yield. Artist Molinos Gordo wants to shed light upon the bureaucratic and political obstacles faced by farmers.

Couscous: Seeds of Dignity
Habib Ayeb

2017, Documentary, duration 57 min
Couscous, with its various recipes, constitutes the staple food of all of the populations of the Maghreb region, including Tunisia. Almost self-sufficient in cereals until the beginning of the 20th century, Tunisia now imports more than half of its food needs as dependency increases year on year. The documentary, filmed in Tunisia, approaches food issues from a local viewpoint and highlights the food productions’ diversity and complexity that go beyond national borders. Couscous: Seeds of Dignity focuses on the political, social, economic, and ecological conditions of cereal and couscous production.

AARG 2022 live event