Artistic Thinking with Practices and Pedagogies

Introduction

The event “Artistic Thinking with Practices and Pedagogies” presents work done in the Academy of Finland-funded profiling project “Artistic Thinking Driven by Artist Pedagogy“.

Performances are given by artist-researchers Pilvi Porkola and Aino-Kaisa Koistinen (University of the Arts Helsinki, Research Institute) as well as special guests Professor Nina Lykke (Professor Emerita, Gender Studies, Linköping University, Sweden, and Aarhus University, Denmark) and Dr. Line Henriksen (Senior Lecturer in Literature and Creative Writing at Malmö University).

Presentations

Nina Lykke: Posthuman Poetics

With  examples from my own research and writing practice that mixes  poetic and philosophic approaches, I will  give an introduction to posthuman poetics, and focus on experiments with modes of reconfiguring the conventional (sovereign) speaking position of the lyrical “I” and the distribution of agencies in poetic worlds from human to more-than-human agencies. I shall  also invite participants to try out creative writing exercises on modes of writing-with rather than writing-about, in particular taking into account challenges arising from trying to write-with more-than-human agencies.

Line Henriksen and Aino-Kaisa Koistinen: Writings from and with the moon(s) – On site-specific speculation and conversation

In our presentation/workshop, we introduce our method of site-specific speculation and conversation, a poetic inquiry of sorts that draws on site-specific writing and reading practices, roleplay, and found poetry. In site-specific reading and writing, the writing process is influenced by the embodied experience of being in spaces and places. With our method, we examine how site-specific writing (and reading) might be developed within the context of speculative worldbuilding. We offer a dialogic presentation of the method and invite the audience members to explore the method with us.

Pilvi Porkola: Practising utopia – Conversations on the sofa

In this lecture, I will talk about the artistic and pedagogical aspects of my project SOFA – Conversations on utopias (2024). This dialogic performance took place in four different locations in Helsinki in May 2024. I invited 8 artists, researchers and activists to talk with me about utopias and social change. I return to the conversations we had on the couch and adapt them into the context of utopian studies and artist pedagogy. The lecture includes a few assignments that we do together.

Presenters

Line Henriksen, PhD, is Senior Lecturer in Literature and Creative Writing at Malmö University. She is the director of the research group The Monster Lab at Malmö University, and her research interests include monster theory, hauntology and creative writing as method.

Aino-Kaisa Koistinen, PhD, Title of Docent is a scholar, a poet, a writer, and teacher of creative writing who currently works as University Researcher at the University of the Arts Helsinki Research Institute. Koistinen’s current project at Uniarts is entitled “Writing-with Others as Artist Pedagogy – Feminist Practices of Creative, Collective Writing in Times of Polycrisis”.

Nina Lykke, Professor Emerita, Gender Studies, Linköping University, Sweden, and Aarhus University, Denmark, is a queerfemme-inist philosopher-poet. Current research:  queer death studies, intersectionality, feminist posthumanism, queerfemme theory, queer ecologies; poetic writing.

Pilvi Porkola, Doctor of Arts, is a performance artist, writer and pedagogue who currently works as University Researcher at the University of the Arts Helsinki Research Institute. Her current research is titled “Performance pedagogy – Politics of Art Pedagogy”.