Tampere Art Museum has once again selected a bold and distinctive talent as Young Artist of the Year - Man Yau, who continues the impressive tradition of pioneers in Finnish contemporary art. The premise of her artistic work is to explore the feeling of “being on display and under pressure. Yau works with sculptures and installations, often incorporating objects or situations recognizable from everyday surroundings. Yau draws on the cultural specificity of different material textures, along with the emotions and connotations those materials evoke. Personal experiences in her work are linked to a wider historical context and the values and meanings carried by the materials.
Yau skilfully uses traditional sculptural techniques and precious materials such as bronze, clay, marble, wood, steel and glass, but also paper, silk and dried flowers, often combining materials in unexpected ways. The materials used and the connotations attached to them play a key role in works that combine both strong and delicate elements. The artist also focuses on herself and her own body in her work, especially in her more recent works.
Young Artist of the Year Man Yau (b. 1991) is a sculptor living and working in Helsinki. She holds a Master's degree in sculpture from the Academy of Fine Arts (2023) and a Master's degree from the Aalto University School of Arts and Design (2018), specialising in ceramic and glass design and material-based work.
Internationally renowned media artist Hanna Haaslahti's new work Ancestors is an immersive installation in which the audience becomes the ancestors of a virtually created family. Through a new kind of portal, viewers are created as doppelgangers, whose faces are merged into a unique, virtual family line.
The Ancestors begins with an unexpected encounter with one's own digital doppelganger. Through the portal, the viewer becomes part of a work in which virtual characters form communities, pairs and family lines. The facial features are passed down from generation to generation, and eventually the individual viewer becomes part of a larger virtual family. The work creates an intimate technological stage that explores questions of society and identity.
Hanna Haaslahti (b. 1969) lives and works in Helsinki. Haaslahti has created the work in collaboration with an international team. The work has been supported by Yle, the European Union and Kopiosto/AVEK.
