Wednesday, 25 June, 5–7 pm, HIAP Cable Factory Studios

HIAP Open Studios provide the resident artists with an opportunity to present their work to local colleagues and audience in an informal and relaxed setting. In June, HIAP Open Studio features Sybille Neumeyer, Margaret O’Brien and Stephanie Steinkopf.

Sybille Neumeyer‘s work focuses on phenomena and structures in science, culture and nature which she translates in installations, video installations or photography or drawings, often based on methods of repetition, archiving and collecting. She uses scientific images and methods as soil for inspiration. Her recent projects investigate the relationships between humans and nature. Observing local situations and rethinking global structures, she aims to enable a dialogue between personal experiential knowledge and the understanding of our environment beyond familiar bodily perceptions.

Margaret O’Brien’s practice explores the hypothesis of repetition in art as a mechanism of semiotic destabilisation, that is, a device that undermines an otherwise reading of the work with the continuous presentation of an alternative. Through a challenging practice involving immersive installation and sculpture, she uses aspects of repetition as a critical and performative structure that disrupts potential contexts and interpretations. This approach is not prescriptive and each work demonstrates an experimental use of materials or media that disturb a pre-existing or familiar relationship to the object. Within this practice, O’Brien is also concerned with boundaries between the physical and the psychological in the apprehension and negotiation of objects, and the conditions of time and space.

Stephanie Steinkopf is a contemporary German photographer with a strong interest in social issues. Her work is focused on long-term projects based on the development of close relationships with individuals. Her long-term project Manhattan – Street of Youth won several prizes and awards, including Vattenfall Photo Award (2012) and gute aussichten – New German Photography (2013/14). Her photographs have been exhibited in Germany and abroad, including Deichtorhallen – House of Photography Hamburg, CO Berlin and Museum Villa Stuck Munich.

Sybille Neumeyer is in Helsinki as a part of the HIAP Residency Programme. Margaret O’Brien Residency Exchange is realised in cooperation with Temple Bar Gallery + Studios in Dublin, Ireland. Stephanie Steinkopf’s residency is organised by Goethe Institut Helsinki in cooperation with HIAP.

Snacks and drinks will be served
Welcome!