artists: Savu E. Korteniemi and Anna-Kaisa Vuonokari
Finnic traditional lullabies often tell about Tuonela, the underworld Land of the Death. In former times parents used to sing lullabies, not only to put their child to sleep, but also to soothe and comfort themselves in the age of high rate of infant mortality.
Savu E. Korteniemi's long-term project “Viimeinen” (The Last Ones) refers to the connection between the Land of North and the Land of Death in Finnic-Baltic mythology. In this exhibition, the project continues by working together with Anna-Kaisa Vuonokari and approaching the theme through their shared interest, lullabies.
We combine in our work themes of night, sleeping, listening and desire to sing together about sadness, yearning and fear at the edge of climate catastrophe, as the Earth is in danger of death, like the children formerly.
We invited audience to bring objects, words or ictures and gave their own contribution to the building of the installation "Cottage of Death" into a place of consolation and resting - but also as a space of sorrow and missing.
In addition to the installation, our text work "Building materials" consisted of building materials of the Cottage of Death, from the ancient Baltic-Finnic lullabies (from the skvr.fi archive).