13.6.2026 - 9.1.2027

The Contamination of Time

Petri Ala-Maunus (FI), Laura Beloff (FI), Andy Gracie (UK/ES), Katri Naukkarinen (FI) and Aurora Del Rio (IT), Elsa Salonen (FI), Emilia Tikka, Leena and Oula A. Valkeapää (FI) Curated by Erich Berger.

The Contamination of Time displays works that tell stories of distant stars, the slow formation of landscapes and the inevitable end of life in a deep future. In The Contamination of Time, you are invited to embark on a journey that unsettles familiar notions of time. At the heart of the exhibition lies the acknowledgment that the future is not a distant, fixed horizon but shaped in and by the present. What is to come is always already contaminated by what is at hand.

A heard of reindeers are swimming towards the land in the video clip. Johtingeaidnu – The Path Within ©Emilia Tikka, Oula A Valkeapää ©filmed by Jan Helmer Olsen

The artworks within The Contamination of Time remind us that we inhabit a world shaped not only by geological, ecological, and cosmic forces, but also by our own decisions, behaviour, and imaginaries. They call for attentiveness to time and our capacity to respond. The exhibition encourages visitors to reflect on how their actions are entangled with time and their environment, and to recognize their agency in shaping futures. If we can imagine countless catastrophes and the end of the world, why shouldn’t we also imagine a world we wish to live in?

Artists of the exhibition

Petri Ala-Maunus (FI) lives and works in Helsinki

Petri Ala-Maunus is a painter who specializes in detailed, large-scale landscape paintings. He paints rugged landscapes in which there is no visible human influence. His works do not depict real places, but rather fictional landscapes. They are inspired by art history, experiences of nature, as well as photographs and album cover art. Ala-Maunus is originally from Kuortane and holds a Master of Arts degree from the Academy of Fine Arts, University of the Arts Helsinki. His works have been exhibited in numerous solo and group exhibitions, including at Kiasma, Amos Rex, the Ateneum, and HAM. He was awarded the William Thuring Prize by the Finnish Art Society in 2010, and in 2019 he was nominated for the Ars Fennica Prize.

Laura Beloff (FI) lives and works in Helsinki

Laura Beloff (Ph.D.) is an internationally recognized artist and researcher. Beloff grew up in a family of artists in Kurikka. Beloff’s life’s work lies at the intersection of artistic production and academic research, with artistic methods and practices at its core. Beloff’s concept- and practice-based research is situated at the intersection of art, science, and technology. Her research explores art, humanity, the environment, and society in relation to science and technology. The results of her research manifest as artworks exhibited in shows, as well as various experiments that explore the convergence of art, technology, biology, and the (natural) environment. She is a professor and associate dean at the Aalto University School of Arts, Design and Architecture.

Andy Gracie (UK/ES) lives and works in Barcelona, Spain

Andy Gracie’s artistic practice makes extensive use of various artistic techniques, including installation, robotics, sound, video, and approaches based on biology and electronics. He incorporates scientific theory into his work. Gracie’s works are characterized by a dialogue with space research, cosmology, and disciplines focused on long time periods—that is, deep time. Recently, Gracie has addressed questions of semiotics—the study of meaning—and simulation theory—the study of reality—in his work. He often explores the post-apocalyptic era in his art. His works has been widely exhibited internationally in both solo and group exhibitions, and has included several commissions for new works. Gracie regularly speaks at conferences and seminars and has published numerous articles and research papers.

Katri Naukkarinen (FI) lives and works in Helsinki

Katri Naukkarinen is an artist, researcher, and curator based in Helsinki. She is a doctoral researcher at Aalto University, from which she graduated with an MFA with exchange studies at Tama Art University. She also holds a BA in Aesthetics from the University of Helsinki. Katri Naukkarinen has been experimenting with different ways of visualizing invisible radiation, both electromagnetic and particulate, and exhibiting them. Naukkarinen has held several solo exhibitions, organised and participated in many group exhibitions, prepared publications and undertaken prestigious residencies, such as AIAV, Méduse and Saari. In addition to her personal work, she is part of the Helsinki Feministinen Salaseura collective and of The Atomic Kinship project with Aurora Del Rio.

Aurora Del Rio (IT) lives and works in Helsinki

Aurora Del Rio is a multidisciplinary artist and Ph.D. candidate at Aalto University. She holds a BA in Painting from the Academy of Fine Arts Bologna, and an MFA in Creative Practice from Transart Institute Berlin/New York. Her artistic practice investigates how the reading of symbolic images interferes with the creation of personal and collective realities. Her current focus is on radioactive contamination as a psychic entity, through the means of ritualistic practices. She is interested in the space of potentiality that originates when a definition is avoided or misplaced, and the liminal space of failure

Elsa Salonen (FI) lives and works in Berlin, Germany

Elsa Salonen’s practice draws on the traditions of painting, installation, and conceptual art. The works are marked by the artistic interpretation of alchemy, which explores the universe through natural materials, and animism, especially the Finnish nature worship. She has graduated from the Fine Arts Academy of Bologna, Italy, and has since worked mainly in Berlin. Salonen’s art has been exhibited internationally with institutions including, KINDL Centre For Contemporary Art and Villa Merkel in Germany; Art Sonje Center in South Korea; Kunsthal Aarhus and Kunsthal Viborg in Denmark; Galleri F 15 in Norway and Miguel Urrutia Art Museum in Colombia. Salonen is represented by Galerie Jochen Hempel in Germany, Le Clézio Gallery in France and China and Ama Gallery in Finland.

Emilia Tikka (FI) lives and works in Basel, Switzerland

Emilia Tikka is a transdisciplinary artist, designer and researcher. Her work explores philosophical dimensions and cultural implications of contemporary biomedical technologies. Tikka’s artistic practice of speculative storytelling includes film, object design and hands-on laboratory research. Her current work and research focuses on collaborative filmmaking in the reindeer worlds of Sápmi, Finland. She is currently a PhD candidate at Aalto University, School of Arts, Design and Architecture in Helsinki. Emilia is also an associate member at the Exellence Cluster Matters of Activity in Berlin and an advisor for speculative and critical design methodologies in CollActive Materials, Technical University Berlin. Tikka’s work has been widely exhibited internationally in both solo and group exhibitions.

Leena Valkeapää (FI) lives and works in Kilpisjärvi

Leena Valkeapää is a sculptor, environmental artist, and Doctor of Arts, having earned her Ph.D. in the arts from Aalto University. Valkeapää has taught sculpture, environmental art, and environmental education at various educational institutions for decades. She has participated in joint and group exhibitions and held
solo exhibitions, primarily in Finland.

Oula A. Valkeapää (FI) lives and works in Kilpisjärvi

Oula A. Valkeapää lives among reindeer in accordance with the Sámi nomadic tradition. Oula A. and Leena Valkeapää have been collaborating since 2011 and have produced internationally recognized art and research projects. Their works are inspired by everyday practices and life among reindeer in the Arctic Sápmi region.

Curator of the exhibition

Erich Berger lives and works in Helsinki

Erich Berger is an artist, curator, and researcher based in Helsinki. He currently works at the University of Oulu in Finland, where he conducts interdisciplinary research into how artists approach temporalities beyond human-centred time, combining cultural anthropology, geology and art. Throughout his artistic practice, he has explored the materiality of information, and information and technology as artistic material. His current artistic focus lies on issues of deep time and hybrid ecology which led him to work with geological processes, radiogenic phenomena, and their socio-political implications in the here and now. In his fieldwork-based practice, he carries out extensive work on natural radioactivity, potential uranium mining sites, and nuclear infrastructure in Finland and abroad. As curator he develops opportunities that create critical transdisciplinary encounters and work situations between professionals from art, natural science, technology and the humanities, recognizing science and technology as fundamental transformative powers of our life world. Berger has worked as chief curator for Laboral Centro de Arte in Gijon, Spain and as a director for The Bioart Society in Helsinki, Finland. His art is exhibited widely in museums, galleries, and major media-art events in Europe and worldwide.

 

 

Photo: Andy Gracie