{"id":2828,"date":"2020-01-13T19:50:48","date_gmt":"2020-01-14T03:50:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/theiff.org\/current\/?p=2828"},"modified":"2022-11-01T00:42:59","modified_gmt":"2022-11-01T08:42:59","slug":"helsinki-biennale-2020","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/theiff.org\/current\/events\/helsinki-biennale-2020\/","title":{"rendered":"Helsinki Biennial 2021 – The Same Sea"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Helsinki Biennial 2021.<\/p><\/div>\n

Helsinki Biennial: The Same Sea<\/a>\u00a0\u2013 curated by Pirkko Siitari and Taru Tappola.<\/em><\/p>\n

Giant coral monsters crocheted out of plastic cluster in a chapel-like space at the Helsinki Biennial<\/em>. Over 18 months during Covid lockdown \u2013 from January 2020 to May 2021 \u2013 3000 Finns worked their hooks to collectively crochet a mind-blowing mass of corals out of fiber and recycled plastic. Vast in scale, this outpouring of Nordic creativity has been curated into two installations for Finland\u2019s inaugural biennial, taking place in downtown Helsinki and on Vallisaari island.<\/p>\n

Helsinki Biennial 2021:<\/em>The Same Sea<\/em>, <\/em><\/strong>gathers together 40 international artists and artist collectives whose work reflects on the interconnectedness of humans, non-human beings, and the environment. For the exhibition\u00a0Crochet Coral Reef<\/em> creators Christine Wertheim and Margaret Wertheim worked with the people of Finland to create the\u00a0Helsinki Satellite Reef<\/em><\/a>\u00a0drawing in participants from far-flung regions of the nation from urban Helsinki to the polar North. Artists, teachers, students, accomplished crafters and novices alike, along with a renowned Finnish designer, contributed over 5000 corals.<\/p>\n

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Coral Forest – Helsinki. Photo \u00a9 Maija Toivanen\/HAM\/Helsinki Biennial<\/p><\/div>\n

Unique to this iteration of the project were four towering\u00a0Coral Forest<\/em> sculptures assembled from an epic array of plastic corals commissioned for the Biennial and made entirely from recycled materials. Playful forms both ludicrous and serious, at once evocative of Dr. Seuss and the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, these totemic works draw our attention to the tsunami of plastic trash pouring into the world\u2019s oceans. Chief among the materials used here was 200 kilos of ribbon-like offcuts salvaged from the industrial production of toilet paper packaging.<\/p>\n

The Helsinki\u00a0Coral Forest<\/em>\u00a0was co-curated by Margaret and Christine Wertheim along with a quartet of talented local ladies:\u00a0Lotta Kjellberg, Elina Ahlstedt<\/span>,\u00a0Noora El Harouny and<\/span>\u00a0Tuija Maija Piironen, aka Team Finland.\u00a0<\/em><\/span>The works were displayed in an underground ammunition bunker, now repurposed as a location for art.<\/span><\/p>\n

Exhibition\u00a0website and photo\u00a0gallery:<\/a>
\n<\/i>Crochet Coral Reef<\/strong><\/i>\u00a0website<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

Exhibition dates:<\/strong> June 12\u2013September 26, 2021.
\nLocation:<\/strong> Vallisaari Island, Finland.<\/p>\n

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Ammunition storage bunkers on Vallisaari island now repurposed as a home for the Helsinki Biennial. Photo \u00a9 Helsinki Art Museum.<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Helsinki Biennial: The Same Sea\u00a0\u2013 curated by Pirkko Siitari and Taru Tappola. Giant coral monsters crocheted out of plastic cluster in a chapel-like space at the Helsinki Biennial. Over 18 months during Covid lockdown \u2013 from January 2020 to May 2021 \u2013 3000 Finns worked their hooks to collectively crochet a mind-blowing mass of corals […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2828","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-events"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/theiff.org\/current\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2828","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/theiff.org\/current\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/theiff.org\/current\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theiff.org\/current\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theiff.org\/current\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2828"}],"version-history":[{"count":50,"href":"https:\/\/theiff.org\/current\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2828\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3375,"href":"https:\/\/theiff.org\/current\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2828\/revisions\/3375"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/theiff.org\/current\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2828"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theiff.org\/current\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2828"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theiff.org\/current\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2828"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}