WHISPERING REEDS

Workshops:

The Saari Residence, Mietoinen, Finland Cromarty Arts Trust, Cromarty, Scotland Litografiska Akademin, Tidaholm, Sweden

Exhibitions:

Post- and Custom house in Eckerö, Aland Islands, Finland Archipelago Centre Korpoström, Finland Kuusisto Art Manor, Kuusisto, Finland

2010-2016

Combining art and science Katja Syrjä and Tiina Vainio initiated a project about common reed (Phragmites australis) including workshops, talk and residencies in 2010-2016.

Our project Whispering Reeds demonstrates the link between art and science. There is an increasing amount of common reed growing along the shorelines around the Baltic Sea. We are looking to highlight this current and complex issue through artistic means, and to inspire discussion about the homogenization on of the species, changes in our cultural landscape and the state of our waterways. In our reed project, which will span several years, we have considered the reasons behind the increase of the common reed and its consequences. We have also discovered different ways to use the reed in our works of art as a material, for example, by turning it into handmade paper in the Åland Islands and in the paper workshop at the Lithographic Academy in Tidaholm, Sweden, by using it to extract colour pigments or by incorporating scientific texts and microscope images of plants into the works themselves. Local invasive plants, and the historical significance and environ- mental impacts of plants were the themes for our work at the Cromarty Arts Trust residence in Scotland. All of the exhibition artists, including Caroline Dear, Heli Konttinen, Leon Patchett , Katja Syrjä, Tiina Vainio and Kimmo Ylönen, participated in our reed workshops in the Åland Islands and at the Saari Residence in Mietoinen. Our shared exhibition on deals with the common reed both thematically and as a material.

Can jewelry made from the common reed make a statement regarding haute couture fashion? What kind of colour pigments can we get from the reed? What types of environmental art and installations can be created from it? What does the reed look like at its innermost core?

Click here to see the PDF:

VASSEN SUSAR

Ruovikko suhisee

The whispering reeds

The Åland Islands Art Museum

ISBN 978-952-5614-55-8