Studioscape
Mandy Barker & Maija Tammi

Landskrona Fotofestival
8 – 17 September 2017

The artist’s studio is an incubator of ideas. It’s the nucleus / ground zero where creative processes develop into visual actualities. A sacred space for exploration, it is also a haven for daydreaming, procrastination and failure. At times filled with the irritation of uncertainty and frustration, the studio can equally be an electric hive of activity where time and discovery culminate into a fully realized work of art.

For artists Mandy Barker and Maija Tammi, the studio truly resembles a laboratory, as both collaborate with scientists in the making of their work. In-depth research plays an integral role in the development of their artistic practice. In their latest series, each investigates microscopic creatures real and imagined. In Beyond Drifting: Imperfectly Known Animals, Mandy Barker envisions plastic marine debris as plankton to illustrate the fact that plastic has infiltrated every level of our food chain. Maija Tammi studies cells that have the potential to live forever. In her series, White Rabbit Fever & Volunteer 4, she contrasts these with the finite mortality of flesh, exposing how beauty and disgust are ever present in our natural world.

Studioscape brings together Mandy and Maija’s most recent projects in an exhibition that explores the link between the artist studio and the gallery space. The inclusion of a facsimile of their working spaces and methods equally examines the role of curator as a translator and reveals the thinking that stands behind their work.