LIFT announces Finnish Visiting Artist Natalia Kozieł-Kalliomäki
LIFT ANNOUNCES FINNISH VISITING ARTIST
NATALIA KOZIEŁ-KALLIOMÄKI
Toronto, September 18, 2023—The Liaison of Independent Filmmakers of Toronto (LIFT) is pleased to announce that Natalia Kozieł-Kalliomäki has joined us from Helsinki, Finland as a visiting artist from September 1 to November 30, 2023 as the fourth resident in the residency program for alumni of the Academy of Fine Arts of the University of the Arts Helsinki. This residency, which started in 2019 as a partnership between the Academy and the Saastamoinen Foundation, is designed to provide international opportunities for alumni in the form of residency grants to prestigious residencies in New York, Maastricht, London and Toronto.
Natalia Kozieł-Kalliomäki (b. 1987, Bydgoszcz, Poland) is based in Helsinki, Finland. She completed a first MA in painting at Academy of Fine Arts in Gdańsk and completed an MA at the University of the Arts in Helsinki in printmaking. She has been showing her works of printmaking and expanded cinema internationally in exhibitions and festivals, such as Alert Live Art Festival, Hanko Film Festival, Wejherowo palace, and the Huuto Gallery; Helsinki. http://www.nataliakoziel.pl
Kozieł-Kalliomäki will be using the time and resources at LIFT to collect 16mm footage material of Toronto and combine it with geometrical pop-up paper animation to create an expanded space installation with multi-sensory experiences and a strong synesthetic feeling. The abstract image will be combined with concrete depictions of the city architecture. Through looping, copying and re-exposures, she will create actions that engage many senses, committed as she is to exploring synaesthesia and the connections between different sensory experiences.
“It is not accidental that film is also called, ‘print’. That’s why, as an artist working at the intersection of expanded printmaking and film, I am deeply inspired by the opportunity to participate in this residency at LIFT to create a new work that explores the relationship between these two mediums. I will work under the slogan “taking spaces”, as I believe that photochemical film is the only feature of human kind that can be immortal and relocate space and allow space to travel. The power of analogue film is to bring people together, to make them build and dream the same dream jointly, to create and experience a unique artistic object in a unique situation. To resurrect this lost collective joy of moving images is the purpose of my project. I hope to evoke a sense of wonder and curiosity in the viewer, and to invite them to engage with the film on a deeper, more intuitive level.”
—Natalia Kozieł-Kalliomäki
Kozieł-Kalliomäki’s visit is made possible by the Academy of Fine Arts at the University of the Arts Helsinki in partnership with the Saastamoinen Foundation.
An in-person event with Kozieł-Kalliomäki will be announced later on this fall.
Academy of Fine Arts of the University of the Arts Helsinki is Finland’s only university-level educational institution in its field. They lead the way in contemporary art education, while fostering the dialogue between teaching in fine arts and the international art community. They train artists and professionals of fine arts who learn their own strengths and expression methods in a world where artists take on multi-faceted roles and profiles. The Academy of Fine Arts has offered artistic education since 1848, and it is at the vanguard of artistic research. They have approximately 280 students and 15 professors.
https://www.uniarts.fi/en/units/academy-of-fine-arts
Saastamoinen Foundation works to promote scientific research and contemporary art. Keynote is part of the international fine arts networks programme launched by the Academy of Fine Arts and Saastamoinen Foundation in 2014, which includes professional mentoring and residency opportunities for master’s students and alumni of the academy. They are one of the founding members of EMMA – Espoo Museum of Modern Art, where their art collection is permanently on display. They also have a long history collaborating with the University of Eastern Finland and Aalto University.
https://saastamoinenfoundation.fi/en
The Liaison of Independent Filmmakers of Toronto (LIFT) is Canada’s foremost artist-run production and education organization dedicated to celebrating excellence in the moving image. LIFT exists to provide support and encouragement for independent filmmakers and artists through affordable access to production, post-production and exhibition equipment; professional and creative development; workshops and courses; commissioning and exhibitions; artist residencies; and a variety of other services. LIFT is supported by its membership, Canada Council for the Arts, Ontario Arts Council, Ontario Trillium Foundation, Ontario Arts Foundation, the Government of Ontario and the Toronto Arts Council.
http://lift.ca
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For additional information please see http://lift.ca or e-mail Executive Director Chris Kennedy at director@lift.ca
Friday 1 September 2023 – Thursday 30 November 2023
Non-members:
Members:
Location:
Liaison of Independent Filmmakers of Toronto (LIFT)
1137 Dupont Street
Toronto Ontario Canada