The multidisciplinary and multicultural exhibition My Childhood opens in Annantalo

My Childhood is a multidisciplinary and multicultural exhibition for children, young people and families. It gathers together stories of childhood created by transcultural artists living and working in Finland. Within the exhibition childhood is connected with culture, identity and diversity. The meaningful and experiential stories find varied forms within the selected artworks.

“I have happily watched how the theme of childhood has inspired artists to take part in a diverse creative process. The exhibition brings together a multicultural setting, where each artist deals with their own childhood, culture and roots through the means of contemporary art. On display are works made with many different techniques, from an interactive work to an installation and from drawings to performances,” says Cultural Producer Harri Piispanen from Annantalo.

The My Childhood exhibition is a collaboration between Catalysti Association of Transcultural Artists ry and Annantalo Arts Centre. The exhibition was curated via an Open Call for Catalysti member artists in October 2020. The exhibition is curated by Paola Livorsi and Tatiana Solovieva from Catalysti and Anna Puhakka from Annantalo Arts Centre.

On Sunday 24th of October from 11 am - 4 pm the exhibition is hosting Family Day, an open event of workshops and performance. Family Day program includes a workshop about lullabies in different languages connected with the sound installation Un(Rest) by Alejandro Olarte & Outi Korhonen; a performance in the installation Sandbox by Josef Ka and a participatory performance for families Next to Kin by Olga Spyropolou & Hanna M. Ouramo. The Family Day is supported by Taike Arts Promotion Centre.

My Childhood artists:

As a child Rosamaría Bolom thought of puzzles as overly complicated objects. Later on that led to a discovery that making art can actually be similar to assembling puzzles. Bolom’s work Assembling Memories invites participants to an intuitive play of assembling shapes and colors.

Zahrah Ehsan’s site-specific work The sky Looks the Same On the Other Side reflects on the space as well as the artist creating narration of images. The work is realized directly on the gallery windows challenging the notion that the grass would be any greener on the other side.

Josef Ka’s Sandbox is an installation and a performance that welcomes you back to childhood memories. During the opening performance the artist plays in the sandbox together with children from a vintage film shot nearly a hundred years ago.

Irina Kreer-Boulay is interested in cultural identity, multiculturalism, cultural stereotypes and clichés. In her work The Birth of a Personality this is represented by a traditional Russian doll matryoshka - as a multi-layered object it can also be seen as an allegory of multiple cultural identities that coexists within one.

(UN)REST, an installation by Alejandro Olarte and Outi Korhonen, consists of nearly 40 lullabies in different languages that transmit both rest and unrest. The listener can choose to listen to the songs individually or as a mass of simultaneously repeating chaos of melodies.

Arlene Tucker’s work is a part of a quest towards understanding herself and her family. Hair Tree explores trust, genetics, and mapping in reflection to "Who is in my family?". It seeks ways to reflect, reveal, and reconnect to one’s identity and belonging in the world. Hair tree is a way of mapping one's family through intertwined locks of hair.

My Childhood
13.10. – 19.12.2021

Annantalo Arts Centre
Annankatu 30, Helsinki
www.annantalo.fi

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Dear journalist, We would like to invite you to the opening of the My Childhood exhibition at the Annantalo gallery on Wednesday 13 October 2021 17:00–19:00. The media will also have the opportunity to interview the artists before the opening, at 15:00–16:00.