Yesterday (Monday), was another normal day at college. I worked with Mica on our board game. My job is to write out the questions for the cards and lay them out in Photoshop while Mica works on the board artwork and cutting out the tokens. I also gave an update to my tutor on how the project was going. Then I had to print out some of the cards I had been designing, and I was shown how to use the laser guillotine to cut my cards. It woulld be interesting to see what other sorts of stuff you could cut in there besides paper, but sadly I wont get to experiment...Lunch consisted of fish in breadcrumbs which was excellent, and then we worked for a couple more hours. It was a productive day at college at the very least.
Surprisingly the snow has started to melt quite a bit, something that shocked us all because it really made the place seem a lot less like Finland and a lot more like Ireland because everything is wet and soggy as opposed to frosty cold and dry. After college Emily, Derek and myself went to the park to sled down the big hill there and build a snowman. Suvi messaged me to let me know the snow was just right for snowman building so I was really excuted to build a reat one as opposed to those tiny ones you can sometimes build in Ireland if enough sleet builds up in the drainpipes. I also wanted to make a snow angel, so that was another thing to check off the bucket list. We had a great time slidin' around on the sleds and hitting eachother with snowballs just so see what it felt like, and we also came across two snowforts that kids must have been using to for snowball fights. I couldn't get over how big the park was, there was a giant pirate ship for kids to play in, as well as several other playgrounds abd facilities. Must be great craic in the summer. After building our snowman we all returned back to the hostel pretty wrecked, but it was worth it to be honest! We were going to cook pancakes for Pancake Tuesday, but we were all so tired that we just had some potato cubes and other small things instead. Maybe we'll get around to them tomorrow! -Amy
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Yesterday I followed along on a tour of the exhibition space for children. Although it was in Finnish it was still useful as the tours for children always involve something practical. Mimi led the tour and came up with different ways the kids could interact with the artwork. Their main activity was to draw a plant that could be found growing in a video installation that they saw in the museum. I spent some time with this installation the day before and i would have assumed that the kids would find it boring but Mimi engaged them really well, she had them playing with their shadows and pointing at things in the videos.
After that I did some more reading from books in the museums library, I did some studies of paintings I found in the children's area of the museum. Today I started by making drawings from sculptures in the storage room which I really enjoy doing. I'm hoping that I can make paintings from the drawings when I get home. Then I helped Anni run some errands. A cello was found in the museum and no body seems to know where it came from, some people think it was from a performance in the 1980's. Anyways, Pori art museum have no use for it so Anni and I drove to a music school who agreed to take it. Then we picked up a photograph belonging to the museum that was being framed. I learned from Anni that because they're a small museum, the roles of the staff vary. She said that if she was working in a larger gallery that her duties would be more set. In this museum she can start her own projects and has a little bit of freedom. I've mostly been thinking about the role of museums in art education the past few days. There are definitely flaws in the Irish secondary school art education system and, from what I've learned from talking to Finnish people, there are similar problems here. Art is usually measured by technical skill in secondary schools and a narrow range of media is usually taught. Of course there are limitations such as time and money that restrict teachers but i think museums can help to counteract this problem. This is why it's so important for contemporary art museums to engage with children and teenagers, to let them have a different view of what art is. Yes it's important to learn about art history but it is equally as important for children and students to witness and be involved in art that's being made today. It's important for them to understand that while technical skill is important, art is also about experiences, discoveries and ideas. I took more pictures of the city today by leaving 20 Minutes early for work this morning and going for a little wander afterwards. Some of them I took on a disposable camera so I'll have to wait to go home to develop them. On top of everything else going on, I'm starting to become interested in photography. -Emily So today started off a bit earlier a Cat, Derek and myself got up around 6am to get ready to meet our classmate Mica at her apartment so we could all get the bus together. I thought I would be suffering a lot more because of the early starts, but it was actually fine, although the bus was so cozy and warm that I nearly fell asleep enroute to college.
Today my team were working on the art for our board game. It’s kind of like a more simpler version of dungeons and dragons, with cards that have multiple choice situations. Choosing one of the answers determines how many points you’ll get per card. Getting enough points and making it to the end of the board means you get to “fight" a wizard, which means you’ll have to roll the dice to land a certain number to defeat him. I made some drawings in photoshop for the tokens used to show how many points you were accumulating. They featured dragons and unicorns, the two main player characters. Lunch was at 11.30am as usual, which I’ve started getting used to, and we weren’t sure if it was spaghetti or stir fry, as it kind of blurred the boundaries between liquid and solid food… It tasted great though. I also had a really tasty ginger cinnamon biscuit that reminded me of Christmas. Then we went back to work for a while and got the bus back to town at 2pm. I’m loving the the work placement, it’s got a very relaxed type atmosphere and walking around in my socks makes everything seem so casual. I keep picking up leaflets I find scattered around the place to find out about more things in the college but then I remember they’re all in Finnish... (It’s happened a lot more often than I’m proud to admit.) Dinner was stir fry prepared by yours truly, and to be honest I’m still really amazed by all the different things in the supermarkets in Finland. They sure do like pickles and hotdogs which is great because I also love that stuff. Also all the liquorice is great, and we stopped by the local shop near the hostel because I really wanted to try out liquorice ice cream. (Spoiler: it’s A M A Z I N G) I’ve also been collecting all the wrappers off all the different snacks I’ve been eating so after the sauna i’m going to stick them in my sketchbook because I think it’s interesting to reflect on those small differences as well as the more obvious bigger ones, like the snow and the language. I’d definitely recommend what we now refer to as “The Chicken”, which are crisps shaped like little chicken legs, but a special shoutout has to go out to the 'Villis', which is an unusual gelatinous yogurt Mica recommended we try. It’s kind of like custard and jelly at the same time. Anyway, tonight we’re going to try out the sauna in the hostel which is apparently a big deal in Finland, so that should be fun... -Amy I noticed yesterday that the staff of the museum usually read papers and magazines during the 9 am coffee break. So I picked one up called 'voma' and flicked through. Even though it was in Finnish and I couldn't read any of it, it was still enjoyable. The fact that I was ignoring the words made the visuals stand out even more. Every page was composed so carefully neatly with colours coordinating. I've noticed that the Finnish people seem to appreciate good design.
I started the morning by getting through my books on Maire Gullichsen. Then I met Sanna upstairs to help her run one of the baby colour workshops. There was reflective paper on the ground and pillows for parents to sit. The group of babies were 4-11 months old, to say they were adorable is an understatement. Sanna started by greeting each baby to get them comfortable with her and proceeded to very simply visually stimulate the babies. She scrunched up baby paper and introduced different 'paints' made from food items. As the babies were playing and exploring, the parents were curious too, smelling and tasting the paints. The workshops aren't focused on an end product, they are about the process of doing. It sounds odd but artists can learn a lot from the way babies play. They do things just to see what happens, they want to touch, smell and taste everything. They don't think about making anything, they're completely engrossed in the moment, discovering something new. In a way, every painting I do also involves me discovering something new about the world or about painting itself. I think it's the same curiosity found so commonly in babies and children that drives artists to keep making work. Before I left I decided to venture into the photocopy room too see if I could print off some pictures of Finnish paintings. Unfortunately, Finnish and English have almost nothing in common and Anni had to help me change the settings to colour. Anni then had an idea that I should imagine what the museum could be like in 10 years. They are about to write an application to the Finnish Cultural Foundation to get funding to improve the museum. Since I have no preconceptions and I'm from a different country, she said my ideas could be more outside the box and could possibly be useful to them. This will definitely be a challenge because I'm only starting to learn how art museums work but i know it will be enjoyable and rewarding. -Emily On our second day at the Villila Studios I felt more comfortable. For me entering a new environment with new people can be overwhelming at times, but the morning talks with Suvi, some of the Finnish teachers and a coffee help relax moods for me.
In the class we had to give a small presentation with our groups to the teachers and some students who would like to listen. We talked about our tabletop board game design and how it would play. My group took the idea of 'Snakes and Ladders', and changed it up to 'Monsters and Portals', fantasy themed game. When you land on a monster, you must roll to how many hit points you can do to it. If you fail to meet the requirements you must go back, for portals you can jump ahead on the board, but we are still figuring out the whole game design, a work in progress. The students this time also talked more to us, learning about each other’s countries and hobbies etc. The language barrier was not as much of a problem as I first thought. It was one of my main worries when thinking about the trip to Finland. In Amy’s group, a girl called Mika offered us to show us around Pori after class to see some of the sights and learn more about each other’s home countries. She was very kind to us ; students confused in this foreign land. She let us know what buses to take and where to get picked up by them, this was a great help because we had no idea. She showed us some sights around Pori and we took small trips into shops that included a book shop, a video game shop with a ton of classic Playstation one games, this gave us a nostalgic feel. We then took a trip to Hesburger, it’s the equivalent of Supermacs in Ireland, it was enjoyable and a nice treat. Mika also brought us to the library and also to play Mario Kart on the Wii. We took one last trip into a shop to buy some supplies, Mika gave us some recommendations on a unique yogurt that is not actually a yogurt but it is! We made our way back to the hostel and said farewell to Mika. So far everything has been positive and a good experience, I’m excited for the coming days and to see what new things we will be shown and new things that we will learn. -Derek Today Amy, Derek and I started with a tour of the Villila Studio College . Suvi, our lovely host picked us up bright and early at 8:30 this morning and brought us to the college and introduced us first to the staff. She showed us the multiple computer labs, the sound recording studio and the film studios. Apparently the small college building used to be a farm house and cow shed! Honestly the whole set up reminded me a lot of GTI back home as our own college isn't that large: http://www.villilastudiot.fi/index.php/en/
Once we settled in we were introduced to the Game Design group that we'll be working with. The students were all quite shy and quiet at first but once we got to talking they opened up a bit. They're all very interesting individuals with their own sense of styles and personalities. I even met a few with a lot of common interests. For the most part the students seem to be working on their own individual projects, mostly designing PC or mobile games. For the duration of our stay however, we've been split up into groups, each including one Erasmus student. We have been tasked with designing a tabletop board game. The design has to include all the typical game graphics like the board itself, the box, cards, tokens, movable pieces etc.. as well as the rules. We also have to test the game within our group and then with our other classmates. It sounds like it's going to be a real challenge but I'm looking forward to it. After arriving back at our hostel we decided to have a stroll around Pori again to see if we could locate the closest shop and just get to know the town a little better. On our way there we noticed that some parts of the footpath in front of the apartment buildings were completely snow free and they had little shoe brushes just outside the doors! It was an interesting sight to see and it took me a moment to really register what the shoe brushes were for as we wouldn't see the same thing back home in Ireland. About 15 minutes after leaving the hostel and a few wrong turns we arrived at the local K-mart, which was actually quite well stocked and surprisingly large. Upon entering Amy noticed that they have adult sized trollies and little kid ones, which we found very amusing as you wouldn't get something like that in Ireland typically. We had a browse around and picked up some shopping before heading back to the hostel to cook ourselves a good dinner. -Cat Today I got a tour of Pori Art Museum from Anni. The building is old and confusing to navigate with lots of little rooms leading into one another. I arrived at 9am which is the time they have their coffee break. The Finnish people start working at 7 or 8 am but since I'm Irish they're going easy on me!
There are lots of offices in the staff area of the museum but the rooms that I am most interested in are the archive rooms and libraries. There are rows and rows of books, photographs, dvd's, cd's and casette tapes dating back to the late 19th century. There is an amazing room full of sculptures, and I have full access to all of it! I mostly spent the day sketching from the books and sculptures, and discovering new artists. Anni helped me find the names of the artists who made the works and gave me books to read. The books are about Maire Gullichsen a Finnish art collector and patron whose collection the museum is based on. I had a good chat with the museums director, Esko Nummelin about how art after the Second World War has expanded into so many various media. He told me that every Irish student that goes to the museum to work always goes away with a different and wider understanding of what art is and after only one day there I can see why. I'm beginning to question what my art is about, the mediums I've been using and they way I've been using them. I'm also trying to make sense of the processes that go on 'behind the scenes' in galleries. - Emily Today was our first day in Pori. We decided to take off on a stroll around the city to find the gallery that I'll be working in, get some coffee, and get Amy a new suitcase! We went the wrong way at first but with a quick trip back to the hostel and some help from google maps we found our way.
We went to Puuvilla shopping centre and had a lot of fun playing with the snow and ice on the way. Pori is very quiet compared to cities in Ireland and although the shopping centre was quite full, the noise level was low. There's a lot of space here, the roads are wider, the footpaths have more room and the buildings are built more far apart compared to Galway. I like the fashion choices of the women here, even though it's -15 they still look good. We stand out in our brightly coloured skii jackets and synthetic gloves while it seems the Finns opt for leather gloves, wool coats and mittens. We're back at the hostel now it's around 5 pm and the sun has almost set. We're working away on our computers and in our sketchbooks, excited to go to work tomorrow. -Emily So, I don’t know about you, but I’m not the biggest fan on flying. Three hours on a plane seemed like a nightmare to me. Surprisingly enough though, I actually thoroughly enjoyed the flight to Finland, so the trip was already off to a great start!
When we landed in Helsinki Airport we all had to split up into our smaller groups, those going to Helsinki, Pori and Raahe. I did not envy the Raahe group, they had another plane journey ahead. I was going to Pori, along with Emily, Cat and Derek, and after saying our goodbyes we made our way to Helsinki Train station. Unfortunately when we picked up our bags the zip on mine had split half way, but luckily enough I had tied a piece of sisal (a rope made from natural fibres) onto my bag to distinguish it. So off the handle it went and around the bulk of my case. I had no more time for a more elegant solution, I had a train to catch. The plan was to get a train from there to Tikkurila, then one from Tikkurila to Tampere, then ANOTHER from Tampere to Pori. I was very nervous about making all our train connections and didn’t get a lot of sleep the night before. The good news was though that we were able to hop on an earlier train from Helsinki Airport which changed our 6 minute connection time in Tikkurila to 30 minutes. It’s the small mercies, ya know... Trains in Finland are really strange, they’re like this vacuum of silence. It was a harsh contrast from the Dublin to Galway train, which is always full of really loud conversations and the smell of a chicken burgers and chips from Supermacs in the air. We also passed through Nokia town, home of the most resilient phone in the world. We were all very relieved when we reached Pori train station, as it had been a super long day of traveling and it was great to get out into the fresh night air. We met Suvi, the teacher from Pori who we were in contact with, who drove us to our hostel to drop off our bags. She then took us to the supermarket. She’s so nice and helped us with our questions about all the different food in the supermarkets. All in all it had been a gruelling day of traveling, but we were really proud of ourselves for making all the train connections and not getting lost. We chilled out in the kitchen and had some food before retiring to bed for a well deserved rest. -Amy |
Art & Animation 2017/18
Map of Pori |