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Staging Area (Not Just for Thousands of Cranes)
Hay, oat, flour and clay from Söderfjärden Vintage petanque balls Vintage eurythmy ball / hammered copper Set of 4 framed photographs 1 of framed photograph 5 digital prints on polymer window stickers: *Original Note: Migration of the Fennoscandian continental land mass. The diagram depicts its movements over the earth’s surface in a north–south direction from Late Archaean times up to the present. The time scale is in millions of years. The circular movement of the shield and the new bedrock areas added to Fennoscandia at different stages, indicated in black, are shown on the diagram.
A group of indexed texts (hand typed with a vintage typewriter and printed): collaboration of Shoji Kato and Heidi von Wright / Written in Swedish, translated in English and Finnish by Anna Rihto & Pasi Kirkkopelto. A list of historical events: Compiled by Lauri Vainio and Shoji Kato The exhibition was curated by Paula Toppila / Executive Director of IHME Helsinki / Pro Arte Foundation Finland
Every autumn, thousands of cranes make a mass visit to the vast flat landscape of Söderfjärden. This staging area – a stopping place – for the migrating birds is an agricultural field which was once underwater. Due to the post-glacial rebound, the depth of the bay that used to cover this field slowly became shallower and fishing became less practical; in the late 18th century, the villagers made their first attempt to regulate the water level with a dam so that it would keep more of the land dry. The efforts of generations to reclaim dry land involved both cooperation and conflict. People dug ditches with hand tools and finally, in the 1920s, set up a pump station for turning the wetland into a golden land that can now yield a vast harvest. In the late 1970s, an article in the Geological Survey of Finland, ‘On the Geology of the Circular Depression at Söderfjärden, Western Finland’, reported an extensive geological investigation into Söderfjärden. Because the geologists found tuffaceous breccia boulders and Early Cambrian sediments, they mentioned the possibility, for the first time, that Söderfjärden might be a post-impact site of a meteorite impact. Later on, in1984, this was found to be true by one of the geologists involved in the article who estimated that the crater was formed at least 520 million years ago. At that time Finland – part of the Fennoscandian continental landmass – was in the southern hemisphere, before being transported to its current position by plate tectonics. This exhibition will feature an installation work, Staging Area (Not Just for Thousands of Cranes) (2022–2023). This work consists of sculptural arrangements of place-specific materials, photographic images and a fragmented script for a fictional play (based on historical events). Together in the gallery space, they sustain a place in which to imagine Söderfjärden as a moving place – a poetic staging area to which organic and inorganic, humans and animals, supporters and opponents, scantiness and sacredness, chance and the will to survive all come from different directions and times, and in which they prepare for the continuation of their journeys. Will they somehow return to this juncture? Shoji Kato
Acknowledgements: The production and exhibition is supported by The Finnish Cultural Foundation and Arts Promotion Centre Finland
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