Finnish Pavilions

With Finnish Pavilions (2012), Anu Pennanen explores the concept of national identity through the architecture of imaginary Finnish pavilions. The installation is constructed of polystyrene, a plastic material widely used for insulation and packaging, and which is usually discarded after use. The Pavilions are made of ‘ready-made’ packages or sculpted from prefabricated insulation sheets to resemble bits and pieces of certain key works of Finnish modernism. Before constructing Finnish Pavilions, I interviewed senior citizens in Helsinki. Their testimonies helped me to better understand the fragile nature of the generations’ experiences behind the official images of a nation they built. The soundtrack, composed with sounds produced with polystyrene, travels under the installation from its one end to the other, navigating the frontiers of abstract and narrative.

Exhibition view: ‘Finnish Pavilions’ solo exhibition at KunsthalleHelsinki Studio 2012.

Finnish Pavilions: Ensemble of 8 sculptures. Polystyrene, surround sound with 5 loudspeakers. Width 480 cm, height 100 cm.

Sound by Titus Maderlechner. Architectural modeling Simona Mihaylova.