All images © Päivi Paakinaho
Päivi Paakinaho is an artist who currently lives and works in Oulu, Finland. She describes her work as being "strongly affected by the perception of space and light living in North of Finland."
Recently she has had a solo exhibition in Rovaniemi, Finland and will exhibit there and in Oulu again in 2010. She has particpated in several group shows in Finland and abroad for example at the Sotiri international prize for young photographers at The National Museum of Arts in Tirana, Albania. Päivi graduated with BA (Hons) Photography from Camberwell College of Arts, the University of the Arts London, and is currently undertaking a MA Fine Arts, in the University of Lapland's mediaculture programme in Rovaniemi, Finland.
Outlining her project, from which the images above are taken, she says, "Resort explores the nature of recreational public spaces through aspirations and assumptions projected onto them. It focuses on the character and on the experience of a space when presented offseason decontextualized in a two dimensional photographic form. Public spaces in the northern parts of Finland function on their assigned use only a couple of months a year during the summer months (and at times a few more in the winter) but the remainder of the year these places remain vacant. I am investigating these spaces in this transitional phase during which their function and nature is in transformation alongside with the season. By looking at these vacant spaces I am exploring the notion of subjectivity in viewing them. How the gaze of the viewer is being influenced by the physical experience, when they are being asked to view a space in a certain way at a certain time. How an individual’s experience of a place is dependent upon their personal relationship with it (intended `use´ of it) and does this relationship change when their attention is drawn to the places' ambiguous nature."
