Emotions on an ironing board and in underwear
The Cupid performance during the opening 13.11. and on Saturdays 17 & 24 Nov and 1 Dec 12 pm – 4 pm
Artist Aulis Harmaala’s installation It will take years includes a combination of items, a sound recording and a performance. The installation is a home-like stage where an ironing board, underwear and other everyday items act out a process of emotions. The items are accompanied by a compilation of songs sung from the heart. In the performance Harmaala shoots arrows as Cupid, giving the audience an opportunity to explore their thoughts on love and hate. The installation presents feelings and emotions as the foundation of
everyday life. Private thoughts of joy, sorrow, jealousy, fear and love are shared in a three-dimensional form.
The following text that leads to the installation: I talk about gentle and painful things. The couples counselor listens. I would like to be quiet. This is just as pointless as a relationship issue of Cosmopolitan. I won’t change. What if I mold the processes of my mind into items? They are just as ambiguous. I see grief, love, hate and caring in my items. From an objective perspective, my life is not filled with pure misery or infinite love, but I have the right to
experience it in the light of my own subjective knowledge. Do I now understand the other person better? I’ll wait, it will take years. Spinoza once said that “Hope is a joy not constant, arising from the idea of something future or past about the issue of which we sometimes
doubt.”
Aulis Harmaala was born in 1966 and currently lives in Helsinki. He graduated with a master’s degree from Aalto University School of Art and Design in 2011. He has also studied at Kankaanpää and Lahti art schools. Harmaala’s works are installations and place-related
performances. The themes he explores lie on the border of public and private, progressing from personal experiences towards public discussion. Dialog and social interaction also form part of Harmaala’s works.
For more information:
www.aulisharmaala.info
