MFA Degree Show Kuvan Kevät 2025 opens on 17 May in Mylly
The MFA Degree Show Kuvan Kevät will take over the entire main building Mylly at Uniarts Helsinki’s Academy of Fine Arts this year, as the exhibition extends from the Kuva/Tila gallery on the ground floor all the way to the Majakka gallery space on the top floor inside the old grain silo. Kuvan Kevät 2025 will be open from 17 May to 15 June.
The annual exhibition Kuvan Kevät showcases the works by students completing their master’s degree at the Academy of Fine Arts. Students from all four subject areas participate in the exhibition: Painting, Sculpture, Printmaking and Time and Space Arts. Kuvan Kevät 2025 exhibits the works of up to 46 fine arts students. The exhibition will be spread across the Kuva/Tila gallery and other floors of the Mylly building.
The object as a catalyst for artistic thinking
Curating an exhibition involves working with artworks still-in-the-making, or ones that only exist as a concept in the artist’s mind, in many, if not most instances. In order to address this reality, Nina Liebenberg, the exhibition’s coordinating teacher, researcher at the Academy of Fine Arts and curator, asked each artist to choose a significant and personal object – one that already exists and something that opens a window into their artistic thinking – at the outset of the exhibition process, as means to start a conversation about “what will be”.
In her curatorial practice, Liebenberg explores how the exhibition process can serve as a meeting point for diverse forms of knowledge and expertise, fostering a deeper collective understanding beyond individual perspectives.
“Although the bodies of works in the 2025 exhibition are divergent and idiosyncratic, common threads can still be found,” Liebenberg notes.
“Artworks connect across the space of the exhibition, forming new collections that hint at memento mori, gift, archaeological artifact, binary code, dystopian remnant, wayfinder, sacred and devotional offering, simulacrum, timekeeper, worm hole, fable, abjection, magic, and, finally, as dematerialised.”
The curator says it was an immense privilege to work with the students leading up to the exhibition opening.
“To experience their dedication, their hopes, their fears and uncertainties and their sheer determination to keep on making, despite living in a period of great uncertainty. This exhibition, with its nuanced and thought-provoking works, bears witness to each student’s creativity and their courage.”
Artists in Kuvan Kevät 2025
Navid Afzalnia, Lola Barraud, Caressa Betist, Eddie Choo Wen Yi, Heidi Forsman, Janina Haapanen, Ramina Habibollah, Milja Havas, Lina Herrmans, Ginko Hsu, Mikko-Pekka Hyvärinen, Sofi Häkkinen, Hermanni Härmälä, Alexa Illi, Ivanda Jansone, Anna Emilia Järvinen, Lal Doga Karakas, Aarne Kivelä, Lassi Kontiainen, Anna-Stiina Korhonen, Aleksandra Kuokkanen, Elias Langi, Tuure Leppänen, Alice Leteissier, Heli Lundström, Jani Luoma, Anni Löppönen, Jone Mutka, Miisa Mäkeläinen, Mari Mäntynen, Dud Nabel, Ellenor Rose Nish, Aala Nyman, Ilia Ollikainen, Lotta Pasila, Jussi Pirttioja, Helena Pulkkinen, Dua Abbas Rizvi, Eetu Ronkainen, Aleksi Salminen, Johanna Sulalampi, Alena Tereshko, Teo Tornberg, Nelly Toussaint, Fanny Varjo, Peng Xiao
Kuvan Kevät 2025 exhibition catalogue
The objects chosen by the artists act as visual mediators of artistic practice and thinking also in a publication that will be published in connection with the exhibition. The artist profiles featured in the publication are written by students from the Bachelor’s Degree Programme in Contemporary Art History and Theory.
Kuvan Kevät – MFA Degree Show of Uniarts Helsinki’s Academy of Fine Arts from 17 May to 15 June 2025
Kuva/Tila and other spaces at Mylly, Sörnäisten rantatie 19, 00530 Helsinki. Open from Tuesday to Sunday from 11 am to 6 pm (closed on Ascension Day, 29 May). Free admission.
Opening event: Friday, 16 May, from 5 to 9 pm.
A special performance-focused event day will be held on Saturday, 24 May.