Tianjun Li

During my stay at the Saari Residence, I will further develop new works built on Free as Birds, an ongoing project that approaches birds as a universal-symbolic figures through which freedom, fragility, imagination, and migration are narrated within human and ecological conditions. Previous chapters have been developed across island and coastal sites in Europe, where folk songs are translated into AI generated bird lyrics and re articulated through my voice, shaped by local vocal traditions and situated within exchanges with local communities, forming what I describe as bird song choirs.

At Saari, I will work as both visual artist and vocal performer, and the project will take the form of vocal and sonic experimentation alongside a photographic and video installation. Through birdsong and ecological rhythms, the work listens for what exceeds language, proposing the human voice as a site of speculative narration that becomes camouflaged within the imaginative grammars of the more than human world.

I look forward to engaging in dialogue with fellow artists and to exploring new possibilities together. The stillness of the site and its surrounding landscape continue to inspire my practice, and I am open to the new forms, encounters, and directions that may emerge at Saari.

Tianjun Li (CN/FI), also known as Timjune, is an interdisciplinary artist working across photography, video, sound, voice, performance, and community-based practices. Drawing from their synesthesia and a four-octave vocal range, Li creates surreal sonic-visual landscapes where more-than-human beings emerge as metaphors for socio-ecological realities. Li holds a master’s degree in Visual Cultures, Curating, and Contemporary Art, with a minor in Sound in New Media, from Aalto University.