Projects

A selection of main ongoing projects

Anniina’s work approaches the interconnectedness of humans and water and the well-being of our planet through performance and sound art. She searches ways to express the different phenomena of water through music and sound. Anniina works collaboratively across the arts and different themes. Her inspiration comes usually from her dreams and from the water-element. Her working method is very intuitive.

“I’m always searching for new ways of expressing myself more profoundly and extensively.”

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Water Rituals

In this project Anniina approaches the interconnectedness of humans and water and the well-being of our planet through performance and sound art. She searches ways to express the different phenomena of water through music and sound.

Water Rituals is an installation and a performance that consists of Iiris-Lilja Kuosmanen’s photographs and video work and Anniina Lehtinen’s soundscape and concert. It is a meditative depiction of the changes in the environment and the power of water – the way in which water takes over areas and creates something new. We have examined water as a life-sustaining element and the rituals and traditions created around it. We look for ways to present the different states of water. The visual content was shot in places that people have changed in an environmentally unsustainable manner as well as in sacred places where people have even worshipped water.

The works lead viewers to a time where water takes over areas after humans. The photos show the signs of environmental destruction, which provides a sharp contrast to the natural world of the video work. The work depicts how these two extremes shape each other. The soundscape made by Anniina Lehtinen takes one to a water-filled ethereal world where the water comes from deep within the earth and reminds one of an ancient time when people would get together to perform rituals around this sacred element.

The Water Rituals performance combines abstract video works to a concert which combines keyboard to reverb pedals and water sounds into an ambient soundscape. It combines a concert composed and played by Anniina Lehtinen to an abstract video work of Iiris-Lilja Kuosmanen. The concert lasts approximatively 45 minutes to an hour and the music is atmospheric and emotional piano music combined with effect pedals and tape recordings of the sounds of the sea. The videos have been shot mostly in Finland and they show the poetic power of the water in a post-humanistic world. The public falls into a meditative, timeless space during the performance. The work is multisensory and tells about the ongoing effects of the climate change on the seas. Photographs have also been shot in places of the great tides in Normandy. Tides reveal underwater worlds people have no part in.

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Fleeting Symphony

Fleeting Symphony is an audio-visual collaboration with Anniina and  film-maker/visual artist Tuuli Teelahti. It is an episodic, single-channeled work shown in a gallery space. The piece consists of coincidental moments and ordinary observations that overlap and make us who we are now. The past and the future are always out of reach. Over time the different episodes filmed in different corners of the world show us a story, one that we are not aware of yet.The work is shown for public in its different states and the artists complete it gradually during the upcoming years so that the work lasts always longer and longer. The common thread of this work is intuitiveness and non-intelligence. Every time they meet each other in different corners of the world they gather new material to another episode.  Even though the end result would feel incomplete at times they won’t return back to the same episode afterwards, but will continue next time with new episodes leaving the incomplete episode there as well.

This process is their statement towards our society which is based on performance-orientedness, consumer society, superficiality and perfectionism. Anniina and Tuuli are against the claim for usefulness and productivity in the artistic process because art is an adventure in the jungle of non-knowing. They and their work will be forever incomplete and that is sufficient. This “Fleeting Symphony” might finally last for days and the spectator can spend time peacefully watching it, even falling asleep to get back to it later again. It doesn’t a have plot, just like life doesn’t have one either, so when it is run in a gallery space you can start and end watching it at any time as most convenient for you. Anniina and Tuuli will work on this oeuvre as long as it feels necessary and it is always finished and unfinished. While working on this project their professional skills with moving image, text, music and sound merge together and they also switch their professional roles during the process. 

Introverted Volcano

Introverted Volcano is Anniina’s solo project. She produces and interprets dreamy art pop tracks adding her voice to layers of synths. The lyrics are mostly written in English and French. As a result she creates dreamy soundscapes that takes the listener to Anniina’s inner world. The themes of the songs stem from Anniina’s life, intertwined with her imagination and inspiration that she gets from her dreams. She composes, interprets and produces the pieces herself (except from mastering). The first album of the project is to be released soon.

“Introverted Volcano is a project that describes my love for electronic music. It is a collection of dreamy art pop tracks that I’ve been composing along with the other projects.”

Would you like to enjoy more of Anniina’s music?