Anne Naukkarinen & Maarit Mustonen

We have been working as partners in art since 2014. What unites us is our interest in questions of the body and language, the relationship between remembering and imagining, and work that cuts across art forms. Naukkarinen has a background in dance, performance and visual art, and Mustonen in visual art and poetry. Our previous works have taken the shape of performances, installations and publications.

At Saari Residence, we will continue the working process we started in the spring of 2020, using various methods of taking notes and recording material, such as bodily, verbal and visual recording. Our working process takes a year, during which we note our observations and experiences of the time we are living in. Based on this work, we then prepare a presentation and publication, which we will share in 2021.

Our work takes place within a process that is entwined with the materiality of time and life – what are the different ways can we record them? What kind of worlds do the combined notes of two different people create? What is the relationship between private notes and the public space?

We feel that the method of note taking involves horizontality and we think it has the potential to dismantle hierarchies: the same notebook page, one body or image may end up bearing a grocery list, some theorist’s thoughts, doodles and outbursts of emotions. Notes are, of course, also a method used in many different fields – it’s a shared method of working. Yet everyone’s notes are unique.

“… and I suppose that keeping in touch is what notebooks are all about.” – Joan Didion

Our method is linked to the process of remembering, which is constantly reshaping – it can call into question established, ruling stories, images and bodies.

At Saari Residence, we are working on material for the Notes 1.4.–9.8.2020 performance draft and trial publication, which we will share as work-in-process versions at the group exhibition Surrender? Surrender at the Exhibition Laboratory in Helsinki from 3 July to 9 August 2020. Our work during the residency will also focus on the time following the summer exhibition: how will we continue to work on the final versions of the performance and publication?

We hope for an intense and inspiring time at Saari Residence! As the only artists in the residence at this time, the experience will certainly be different and special. After leaving the Saari Residence, we will continue our residency for a while at home, for example by hanging up our works in the exhibition space