Research Catalogue

In the Mirror of Care Work researches skills within Nordic interactive performance practices. Using the mirror as a metaphor for visualisation and connection, artist Inga Gerner Nielsen brings into conversation the work of nurses and interactive performers. By inviting in the perspectives of care workers and looking into the history of their profession, Inga engages in discussions about the politics, mythologies and poetics of her own field. What do we see when we look in the mirror, and when that mirror is a nurse? Do we, as performers – like the nurses were once said to – abide by the feeling of a calling? Does this involve a kind of spiritual care for our audience? And what of the nurses’ working conditions should we perhaps try to adopt as (care giving) performers? The project visited Stockholm (MDT) in September 2023 and Helsinki in January 2024 in a two-day symposium to meet and exchange with local artists about the aspect of care work in their artistic practice . The project is based in a long-term collaboration with the nursing school at UCN Hjørring & Thisted in the north of Denmark. Together with teacher of the History of Nursing, Helle Kronborg Krogsgaard, Inga gerner Nielsen is developing ways of integrating interative performance excersices and visual art into the teaching of 1.st, 4th and 7th semester nursing students.

Research Portal of Janacek Academy of Performing Arts in Brno

The exhibition Estranhamento (Strangeness) aims to share the visual art work developed by researcher Catarina Casais, associated with her doctoral project Políticas de Estranhamento: Práticas de resistência e revigoração docente (Policies of Strangeness: Practices of resistance and teaching reinvigoration). These drawings, linocuts and embroideries seek connections between her artistic practice and research work, promoting possibilities for reflection on the teaching profession in the visual arts and the teaching demonstrations that took place between 2020 and 2024. The challenge in developing these works is to think, based on the materiality of the teaching demonstrations, about possible languages through the techniques and materials used. These languages reflect a desire to think about the daily reality of visual arts teachers and the moments of protest related to their professional practice. Linocut, embroidery and drawing become ways of addressing the issue of visual arts teaching and its politicisation within the school environment, inviting everyone to visit the thinking laboratory that has been developed over the last academic year at Atelier Sem Forma.

Duodji refers to Sámi handicrafts and design. I reflect on the knowledge base of duodji thinking, how duodji is learned within the community, and how I have developed the teaching and research of duodji according to the principles of duodji and art. I also contemplate the essence and presentation of duodji in public spaces through the pedagogical-artistic practice, LaavuStudio."

This exposition takes as its departure the systemic inertia identified within Western Higher Music Education (HME), where education is driven by skill acquisition in a master–pupil format. Such approaches may hinder the growth of adaptable and reflective musicians. We propose an alternative: student-centred learning inspired by artistic research methods. To explicate this, we draw on findings through our own artistic research practices. Our hypothesis is that the model of the artistic, embodied research laboratory, as developed within the field of artistic research, may serve as a potent tool for renewal. By analysing our work as artist-researchers and educators, this exposition offers insights that support rethinking both institutional structures and pedagogical approaches in HME. Our aim is to strengthen student agency in learning situations and set them off on a path of lifelong learning. This research demonstrates that artistic research laboratories can provide practical frameworks for transforming HME pedagogy, offering educators concrete methods for fostering playful, inclusive, and sustainable learning environments whilst empowering students as active agents in their musical development.

Queer-identiteetti ja -tunteet lavalla, sen takana ja opetustyössä Kuvataiteen tohtorin opinnäytetyössäni tutkin queer-kuuntelemisen merkitystä taiteellisena käytäntönä ja tutkimusmenetelmänä. Tässä ekspositiossa haastattelen drag alter egoani Maimu Brushwoodia, jonka kanssa keskustelen sukupuolesta, tunteista ja pedagogiikasta. Haastattelu perustuu tutkimukseni toiseen taiteelliseen osuuten, mikä oli drag-esitys, jonka esitin kahtena iltana Club Kiihko: Uuden toivon illassa Kulttuurikeskus Caisassa Helsingissä 27. ja 28.6.2024. Ekspositiossa on haastattelun lisäksi drag-esityksen videotallenne ja kirjoitustehtävä, jonka tarkoitus on syventää esitykseni teemoja.