JENNI LAITI & LADA SUOMENRINNE – ancestral utopias / ádjagiid álggut

Jenni Laiti and Lada Suomenrinne’s joint exhibition Alku-utopiat (Ancestral Utopias) depicts the endings and beginnings of Sámi worlds, the transience of the Arctic landscape, the presence of ancestors and opens up possibilities to move through the end of the world towards new beginnings.

The video works Biegga bieggá by Laiti and Suomenrinne and Teardrops of our Grandmother by Laiti and Utsi deal with the end of the world through mourning. Laiti’s Do things in circles installation allows you to walk into the next world and Suomenrinne’s photo series Emergency weather creates an emotional map of the proximity of other species and ancestors in the backyard.

We travel backwards and forwards in time, from one world to another, changing shape and changing form, the world changing and our being in it changing. When we make art, we are the river with which we have collaborated. When we collaborate with the earth, we are the earth. We change our form into other living life, stone, wood, forest. We are not just a fish, we are a fish in the river. We are not just a tree, we are a tree in the forest. We are not just earth, not just air, but the world.

Exhibition artist support provided by Museovirasto.