19.5.2026
Phantoms and Borderlands – Kunsthalle Seinäjoki Announces New Exhibitions for Spring 2027
The new exhibitions for spring 2027 explore the boundaries of both wilderness and community.
In January 2027, Mark Tholander’s solo exhibition Phantoms will open in the Halli space at Kunsthalle Seinäjoki. Phantoms marks the Danish artist’s first solo exhibition in Finland. Combining performance, sound, and sculpture, the haunting exhibition is unlike anything previously presented in Kunsthalle’s history. The exhibition evolves and transforms over the course of its run.
Phantoms is open 23.1.2027–22.5.2027 in the exhibition space Halli of the Kunsthalle Seinäjoki.
In March 2027, the group exhibition Borderlands (Erämaan rajat) will open in the Vintti space at Kunsthalle Seinäjoki. The exhibition features works from Mari Mäkiö and a collaborative group (Jani Hietanen, Jouni Mitjanen and Marko Tandefelt), Anssi Jokiranta and Anna Ruohonen, and Hanna Kanto. Employing a wide range of contemporary art techniques, the exhibition explores what the Finnish wilderness might look like in 2027.
Borderlands is open 6.3.2027–7.8.2027 in the exhibition space Vintti of the Kunsthalle Seinäjoki.
Mark Tholander: Onomatopoeia For a Hissing Kettle
Mark Tholander examines communities through the lens of body horror
Mark Tholander’s solo exhibition Phantoms explores communities in a fragmentary contemporary world. In the exhibition, Tholander transforms domestic furniture into monstrous sculptures that evoke the phantom pains embedded within communities. Communities harbor fears and prejudices both toward themselves and toward the “others” excluded from them. Furniture plays a significant role in the formation of community. Within the home, it acts as the glue of communal life: a source of permanence and familiarity.
The Phantoms exhibition is performance-based. During the spring, Tholander performs and continuously reshapes the installation in the Halli space together with a working group. The constantly evolving exhibition reflects the nature of community itself. The ghostlike soundscape of the installation, which changes throughout the exhibition, reminds us that behind every community there lies an entire realm of silent gestures and unseen actors. Communities are built on negotiations that define who belongs and who remains outside as “others.”
In the exhibition, Tholander draws on the aesthetics of body horror and domestication to explore otherness. By tapping into bodily fears and anxieties, he exposes the visible and invisible boundaries communities construct between the familiar and the alien.
Mark Tholander, photo Agnete Brun
The Artist
Mark Tholander lives and works in Copenhagen. His works have been exhibited at the Aarhus Kunsthalle, the Riga Performance Festival, New Media Artspace, and at several film festivals in, among other places, China and France. In his artistic practice, he explores communities, communal life, and the social rules that define them.
The exhibition opening will be held in conjunction with Kalevan Navetta’s Winter Day on January 22, 2027.
Mari Mäkiö: process photo
Expeditions into the Finnish wilderness
Borderlands (Erämään rajat) is a group exhibition that invites viewers to search for wilderness. In Finnish, the word erä refers to a share or portion. At the same time, it reflects a familiar Finnish relationship with nature: the forest as a source of food and materials. The exhibition is inspired by duality and contradiction embedded in the concept of erämaa (wilderness). Erämaa refers both to untouched nature and to a relationship of use and dependence between humans and the natural world.
Anssi Jokiranta and Anna Ruohonen travelled in wilderness areas in the 2000s, but instead of finding an untouched, pristine landscape free of human presence, they encountered stories about such a place. Jokiranta’s wet plate landscape photographs and Ruohonen’s travel diary entries reflect on what we imagine wilderness to be, and what role it plays today.
Hanna Kanto explores forest insects and plants in her paintings and sculptures. In her earlier work, she investigated human practices of extraction in relation to nature.
Mari Mäkiö and her working group present a sound installation that explores the co-existence of humans and bark beetles. The bark beetle is a forest inhabitant that is almost invisible to the human eye. The group brings the sounds and traces of bark beetles into the exhibition space. Spruce bark beetle (latin Ips typographus) is considered a pest among Finnish foresters.
The exhibition opening will be held in conjunction with Kalevan Navetta’s Afterwork Art event on March 5, 2027.
Kunsthalle Seinäjoki
Kunsthalle Seinäjoki showcases art exhibitions and offers a varied programme of other events. The charming exhibition spaces and multidisciplinary community at the Art and Culture Centre Kalevan Navetta provide a framework for a visionary contemporary art programme. Kunsthalle Seinäjoki draws inspiration from the story of the building as well as the themes and issues arising from the countryside – both in South Ostrobothnia and globally.
.Find out more about the venues and programme choices.
Press photos will be updated to: http://bit.ly/STpressikuvat
Photo: Anssi Jokiranta, Villi maa
Contact:
Laura Laukkanen, art curator
tel. +358 40 774 8560
laura.laukkanen(at)seinajoki.fi
