Boutique – Where Art Meets Fashion

An exhibition combining fashion, art, dance and music called Boutique will be taking over the Amos Anderson art museum in late summer. Curated by Annamari Vänskä, the exhibition will combine visual, material, musical and dance arts into one large total artwork, or Gesamtkuntswerk.  As its name implies, Boutique is reminiscent of a fashion house: architects Jaakko Pesonen and Klaus Aalto  will transform the museum facilities into an area containing shop-in-shops, where artists and designers will create collaborative works. The exhibition's logos are based on photographs prepared as collaborative work by artist Rauha Mäkilä and photographer Jualiana Harki as well as on Mäkilä's paintings. The music and sound for the works on display will be designed by Vellu "DJ Slow" Maurola who works with UMO Jazz Orchestra. The exhibition is part of the official World Design Capital Helsinki 2012 programme.

A piece by artist Tero Puha and fashion designer Teemu Muurimäki revolves around a luxurious perfume called Body Beautiful (Remix). In their work, the pair examine branding and how a product can be formed into a desirable product using visual methods.

Artist Katja Tukiainen and fashion designer Samu-Jussi Koski will be creating an installation named Tyttöevakot for the exhibition. Tukiainen has designed an army of girls composed of statues, for which Samu-Jussi Koski is designing a Karelian-influenced clothing range. Their work tells a story both charming yet political, in which good triumphs over evil.

The work by fashion designer Paola Suhonen and artist Mikko Ijäs is based on videos which relate to fashion in a fundamental manner. The base for the work, which is constructed in the form of an installation, is made up of short films by Paola Suhonen, onto which Ijäs has painted his own paintings using iPhone technology. Suhonen is studying film directing in Los Angeles.

The performance installation 15% by clothes designer  Timo Rissanen and space designer Salla Salin comments on the side of the clothing industry which remains unseen by the consumer. The work poses questions on the true price of the global market economy by forming a production line in the museum producing "cheap" white T-shirts.

The work by artist Jani Leinonen and shoe designer Minna Parika emphasises the link between fashion and art in the form of a surreal spatial piece. The pair of artists will build a three-room space installation in the museum, of which the majority will present Leonen's wallpaper, which draws on influences from pop art, and shoes designed by Parika for Boutique

Artist Heidi Lunabba and artistic duo Nutty Tarts (a.k.a Katriina Haikala and Vilma Metteri) will produce a collaborative art project named Cultural Dresscode to the exhibition.  Its aim is to investigate the ways in which different groups distinguish themselves and build their own identity through style and dress. The group of artists will invite people to participate in the work and share what kind of group they feel they belong to. Based on the participants' answers, the group will construct changing rooms in the museum, in which the results generated by the project will be presented to the audience using photographs and video.

Choreographer Anna Mustonen, clothes designer and photographer Jasmin Mishima and Federico Cabrera (Gilles et Dada), video artist Timo Wright, sound designer Heidi Lind and dancers Saara Töyrylä and Masi Tiitta will combine dance, fashion and sound design as well as video art in an unconventional way. The work examines how clothing shapes us, how we move and our identity.

More information

Kaj Martin
Senior Curator
Amos Anderson Art Museum
Tel. +358 9 6844 4632
kaj.martin@amosanderson.fi