FNG Research: participatory art

Gill Crabbe, FNG Research

When a national collection marks a milestone in its history, it offers a chance to get a glimpse of the changes that have contributed to its evolution. Gill Crabbe asks three curators from the Museum of Contemporary Art Kiasma / Finnish National Gallery about the process of preparing a new book that opens the doors to the past 30 years of the museum’s acquisitions

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In our digital age when e-books and online webzines are the order of the day, the production of a book is a special project. It is an In Real Life event, a hand-held object that has a physical life and span, something not only to be read, but for the reader or readers perhaps to adorn with personalised marginalia, a concretised narrative that can be physically place-marked with folded page corners, easily navigated (no endless screen scrolling) and delved into anywhere anytime without plugging-in. The book, far from being an anachronism, is in fact gaining in value as the exponential expansion of electronic media progresses. And books, especially when commissioned to commemorate or celebrate, can be a multiple monument, honouring achievements over time. This is the case with a beautifully produced and lavishly illustrated book, The Many Forms of Contemporary Art, which celebrates 30 years of collecting contemporary art. It is the Museum of Contemporary Art Kiasma’s monument to its own art collection, in book form.

‘ I think a physical book is still important and it’s a topic we discussed a lot ourselves,’ says Kati Kivinen, Chief Curator of Collections at Kiasma, one of three of the museum’s curators who were driving the project. ‘Personally, I prefer to roam through a book when accessing a theme or topic, rather than looking at hundreds of images of artworks online, even more so after two years of watching everything on screen during the pandemic. Also the book is closer to the works themselves, being concrete – a book lying between an image on screen and the actual artworks.’

In addition to its celebratory aspect, the decision to publish the book was also practical – Kiasma has been undergoing renovations since early 2021 and with its exhibition spaces out of action, and many projects off the agenda, the museum’s curators found themselves time-richer, and in Kivinen’s words ‘with an opportunity of a book project on 30 years of collecting. We have never done a comprehensive overview of the collection like this before and since our publications have always been linked to the exhibitions that we present, this offered a rare chance to concentrate on the collection without this kind of agenda.’

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Featured image: Nina Roos, Lost in Yellow, 2000, oil on polycarbonate sheet, metal stand, 90cm x 175cm x 241cm (each sheet), installed in the lobby at Kiasma
Finnish National Gallery / Museum of Contemporary Art Kiasma
Photo: Finnish National Gallery / Petri Virtanen
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Read more — Download ‘Celebrating Three Decades of Collecting Contemporary Art’, by Gill Crabbe, as a PDF

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Kaija Kaitavuori, PhD, art historian and researcher on contemporary art

Also published in Saara Hacklin, Kati Kivinen and Satu Oksanen (eds.), The Many Forms of Contemporary Art. The Kiasma Collection Book. A Museum of Contemporary Art Publication 175 / 2022. Helsinki: Finnish National Gallery / Museum of Contemporary Art Kiasma, 2022

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In the late 1990s, art exhibitions began to include works that required active participation from the viewer. It was no longer enough just to look at the works: they invited or even demanded that the visitor do something. This feature has changed the traditional exhibition experience. It has also posed new challenges for museum collection and exhibition practices.

The viewer engages in dialogue

In 1996, the Museum of Contemporary Art held an exhibition that deliberately opened up space for the visitor’s contribution. Curated by the Chief Curator Maaretta Jaukkuri, the exhibition was called ‘Dialogues’.^[1] The artists presented the opening lines and then handed over to the viewers, who added their own responses to the discussion. Together, these tentative, suggestive and experimental contributions formed the actual work of art.

One of the works in the exhibition was a sculpture by Tiina Ketara: a human-sized figure, resembling the artist, lying on the floor. As the viewer approached, they heard a gentle plea: ‘Help me. Hey, you there, come closer!’ The work asked the viewer to help her sit up and eventually stand. When the viewer complied, the doll chatted some more, said that things were not going well, and finally sang a song. Confronted with the work, the viewer had to make decisions about his or her own attitude and actions. Should I accept the invitation, step up to the work, touch it? In making the decision to participate, the viewer entered the territory of the work, became part of it and at the same time was exposed to the gaze of others in the space. The visitor was no longer a spectator among others, but part of the work: a participant. The very title of the work, You and I (1996), addresses the viewer. Here we are: I, the work, lying here, and you, next to me, watching, listening, perhaps touching. Or maybe ‘I’ is the spectator, and ‘you’ the work, in front of me, talking to me, making a request. Or is ‘you’ the other spectator, with whom we negotiate, perhaps without words, the modus operandi. Will you go, shall I join you, do we dare to approach?

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^[1] The foreword of the exhibition catalogue quotes David Bohm, who defines dialogue in a broad way as ‘a stream of meaning flowing among and through us, and between us’. Maaretta Jaukkuri (ed.). Dialogues. A Museum of Contemporary Art Publication 36/1996. Helsinki: Finnish National Gallery / Museum of Contemporary Art, 1996, 6–7.

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Featured image: Johanna Lecklin, Story Café, 2004–10, videotape, video projection, neon sign and live art, photographed at the ‘It’s a Set-up’ collection exhibition at Kiasma, 2010.
Finnish National Gallery / Museum of Contemporary Art Kiasma
Photo: Finnish National Gallery / Pirje Mykkänen

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Read more — Download ‘Dialogues, Complaints, Coffee, and Dough. When the Viewer Participates’, by Kaija Kaitavuori, as a PDF

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