We know that our current way of consuming is not going to make it in the long term if we want to keep this planet alive. Thankfully, many of today’s designers are exploring new ways to innovate more sustainable materials for future products. (Continues…)
How does a person defend the particularity of one’s identity in a digitalized world? Hyperculture is the result of endless mixing of origins and ideas on the web. Hannaleena Heiska’s exhibition Camouflage touches not only the current theme of an individual’s right to privacy, but also the actual fluidity of identity. ”About a year ago I bumped into an article about an anti-facial recognition algorithm to conceal people’s identities with the help of make-up. The idea of hiding one’s true identity or even creating temporary one started to fascinate me.” (Continues…)
Jonna Kina’s work lies at the junction of sound and art. Viewing Kina’s art objects requires you to make connections, to find the thread that runs through the visual and aural ideas she presents. In Somnivm, she removes the human element from the images of the marble quarries at Carrara, allowing the viewer to discern what has caused the beautiful destruction of the landscapes. Here, the sound adds to the emptiness in the landscapes by filling it with the natural, authentic sounds recorded at the quarries. (Continues…)
The basis for the future of design lies in material innovations. In this series of articles we explore just a few of the many ideas that the Around Team feels could make a difference and change the way we think about the materials that surround us. (Continues…)
It seems that this is almost a ‘Golden Age’ of Finnish fashion. Technical innovations have preceded these revolutionary periods in history. And such is partly the case this time around. Social media has enabled in many areas of culture for niche to become mass. More importantly, in this time and age, the challenge is to create something long-lasting. Many of these designs captured by photographer Eeva Suutari will certainly stand the test of time, and more. (Continues..)
Lotta Wennäkoski’s Until the Dreams at times feels like a crowd assembled to shout at you, a comic play and a love song to Finland. Composed for the 90th anniversary of the Radio Symphony Orchestra and the 117-year-old Polytech Choir, Wennäkoski writes odes about love that almost soothe you, if her complex rhythms weren’t creating such a sense of excitement, even at times wonder. (Continues…)
The interrelations between mankind and nature set the ground for Peter Holliday’s photographic work. In his current exhibition The Mountain of Fire, featuring images from his series Where the Land Rises, he investigates themes of absence and remembrance by studying the volcanic eruption of Eldfell on the island of Heimaey in 1973 in Iceland. (Continues…)
Helsinki-based menswear line FRENN mixes traditional suiting and casual style serving the demands of modern living. Around Journal interviewed founders Jarkko Kallio and Antti Laitinen on their label’s latest collaboration with visual artist Stig Baumgartner. Individualism, sustainability and athleisure are today’s key words in fashion and FRENN manages to contribute to all these ideas. (Continues…)
Inka Bell (b. 1981) was selected as Grafia’s Graphic Designer of the Year 2018. Bell works open-mindedly in-between design and art, concentrating specially on serigraphy. In her current prize exhibition Zanni at ARTEK textures, structures and the sense of different materials have an apparent role. Her approach to the relationship between two-dimensional and three-dimensional forms is intriguing. “I mostly work with paper, and I try to find new ways to utilize this mundane material. Quite often we see and use paper as a two-dimensional surface, and I am interested in studying how we can use it in a new way.” (Continues…)
Contained and eruptive, the galvanic impressions that contemporary artist Elina Merenmies meticulously paints and draws seize the viewer with their sense of truth. “I was probably six years old when I fantasized about the profession of an artist, and by the age of eight I painted with oil colors for the first time. When I was young, drawing and painting were somehow ways of staying sane; nowadays they are an inseparable part of normal, happy everyday life as well as what feels like good physical work.” (Continues…)
