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Elverket Wed–Sun 11–17 | Sinne closed 18.3–12.4. Next exhibition opens 13.4

Minna Långström and Dafna Maimon selected as residency artists for Snäcksund Villa in 2023-2025

Minna Långström and Dafna Maimon have been selected as residency artists for Snäcksund Villa in 2023-2025.

The Villa is a three-year residency programme aimed at artists and curators. During their stay participants work in close collaboration with the Pro Artibus Foundation within a framework of projects related to the Foundation’s exhibition, collection or audience work. The programme includes living and working grants. The Villa was built in 1857 and houses two dwellings. The grounds include a detached building with two studios for recipients of The Villa’s grants and a workroom that can be used by participants in The Croft programme.

 

Minna Långström (b. 1974 Tammisaari) is a media artist and filmmaker. Her artistic work consists of films – short fictional films and documentaries – and film installations that combine moving images with spatial – occasionally interactive – elements. Her work processes tend to be extensive, well researched and interdisciplinary. In it she focuses on aspects of society using technically mediated narratives and visual technology, and on specific historical events, and their cinematic representation and effects on the current situation. The core of her work is in the intuitive experience and the role of the viewer.

Långström’s works have been shown in various museums, such as: Museum of Contemporary Art Kiasma; Frankfurter Kunstverein; and Moscow Museum of Modern Art; and also in galleries including: Kunsthal Charlottenborg, Copenhagen; Galleri Elverket; Kunsthalle Helsinki; and Kunstfort Vijhusen, the Netherlands. Långström gained a Master’s in Fine Arts from the Academy of Fine Arts, Helsinki in 2003, and her studies also included exchange studies and work experience at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, USA. She has been on several artist’s residencies, among them, London Space Studios; IASPIS (NIFCA), Stockholm; and FACT, Liverpool, UK. The Finnish Art Society awarded her the William Thuring Prize in 2017. The film Other Side of Mars, directed by Långström, was shown at film festivals such as DocPoint – Helsinki Documentary Film Festival; Bergen IFF; Pariscience International Science Film Festival, Paris; and Ji.hlava IDFF, Czech Republic, where it won the Testimony on Knowledge prize.

 

Dafna Maimon (b. 1982 Porvoo) lives and works in Berlin. Her artistic work spans performance, video, installation and contexts for public participation. The individual is central to her art, along with their wellbeing in society. She looks at how we deal with memory, stereotypes and traumatic experiences, and out of this creates thought-provoking narratives. Maimon’s works also address social codes and the absurdity involved in emotional and ethical conflicts in everyday life. At the same time as her expression is marked by a warmth and humour that are easy to take in, there is an undertone that is intended to directly criticize existing power structures and to encourage individual freedom and autonomy.

Dafna Maimon gained a Master’s in Fine Arts in 2008 from the Sandberg Institute, Amsterdam. Her art has been shown, for instance, at: Kunst-Werke, Berlin; MoMa PS1, NYC; Künstlerhaus Bremen, Germany; Mahj Jewish Museum, Paris; Lilith Performance Studio, Malmö, Sweden; Kim? Contemporary Art Center, Riga, Latvia; Gallery Wedding, Berlin; and Space Gallery, Portland, Maine, USA. Her most recent appearances in Finland were at the Helsinki Biennial in 2021 and the AISTIT / coming to our senses exhibition at Kunsthalle Helsinki. Maimon has previously been in residence at: IASPIS, Stockholm; Nida art colony, Nida, Lithuania; Künstlerhaus Bethanien, Berlin; and Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, NYC, USA.

 

Image: To the left Minna Långström. To the right Dafna Maimon, photo: Anton Stüber.