Minna Virkki

I am a Multi-discipline Artist and an alumni of the Royal College of Art, where I graduated in 2019. I currently reside in Helsinki, Finland. I have previously exhibited my works in group exhibitions in London and Espoo.

I often research abandoned spaces in my work. Places that are present in everyday context but somehow otherworldly. Doors lead to places and the audience in a dialogue with parallel realities, subconscious and intuition. ‘A portal’ might as well be a mobile phone or a VR headset, that reveals things that couldn’t be seen with the naked eye.

I have examined the impacts of noise pollution in the ocean to amplify the voices of organisms that do not speak the same language with us in an aim to create a discussion between humans, machines, and nature through abstractive and experimental storytelling.

My work ‘The Only Way Out Is In’ considers whether the attention autonomy in VR is a result of a development in new technologies or does it have a socio-political context in the neoliberal paradigm of individual choice, which has reached its climax? Or are we just so afraid to face threats like climate change, a current political atmosphere, and tensions that we have directed our gaze inwards, to ourselves, looking for an alternative from parallel worlds, subconscious and meditation? Is the shift to virtual reality a result of the fact that humans have done all they can with the real world, and as a result, the only way out is in?

The theoretical framework for my research relies on Object-Oriented Ontology, Speculative Realism and Panpsychism - the view that all things have a mind or a mind-like quality.

Recently, I have outlined the specific nature of different media and ways of production to explore how materials and tools (manual and digital) affect thinking in creative processes.
By using previously unfamiliar mediums and methods I try to draw interconnections between conceptual thinking and material reality.