Seeking Solitude? Multimodal representations of nature

Is it necessary to detach from social relationships to connect with nature? What are the Kalevalaic poems expressing when they lament family ties and find a sense of home in the forest? What is the care of the duckboards, and could they be understood as hyperobjects? What kind of heterotopia is the forest? What is the forest after all?

Tiina Seppä will bring together contemporary digital representations of Finnish mire landscapes alongside folk poetry and ethnographic materials. The materials seem to collectively reveal a long-standing cultural pattern: meaningful engagement with nature is closely associated with solitude and withdrawal from human society. While the media and historical contexts differ, the underlying logic persists. From lyrical poetry that frames the forest as a refuge to contemporary hikers seeking empty landscapes—and to social media images that visually erase other people—solitude emerges as a central condition for experiencing and representing “nature” in Finnish contexts.

Tiina…