Thursday, January 17, 2008

Finland's Anti Festivalen

This past September I headed off to Finland to make new work for the ANTI Festival in Kuopio, where I was the only American among a group of artists coming from across Europe, Australia, and Canada to make place-specific projects in and around this small town. My project involved interviewing Finnish teens to ask their advice on issues like dealing with body image and fitting in. The advice was then formatted into bilingual brochures. These were formatted like the ones you might find at a doctor's office or pharmacy, only in this case the experts were not medical professionals or pharmaceutical companies, but the young people of Kuopio. The brochures were then distributed across the city in coffee shops, waiting rooms, and by hand. You can download two of these as PDFs and see images from the project HERE.

ANTI (which means "offering" in Finnish)," is an international contemporary arts festival presenting site-specific works made for public space. Over the past six years ANTI has presented live, sonic, visual and text-based art from today’s most exciting and innovative artists. A truly international festival and Finland’s foremost presenter of Live Art, ANTI is a meeting place for artists and audiences fascinated by how art shapes and responds to the places and spaces of everyday life." Check out this year's events -- and apply for next year's festival -- at www.ANTIFESTIVAL.com

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