Kainuu

According to Finnish folklore, the world was created out of the shells of gold and iron duck eggs and the first human was born to a goddess impregnated by the wind.The mythology, known as Kalevala, hails from the region of Kainuu, an area famed for its vast wilderness but plagued by steep population decline. What remains of the mythical past in contemporary globalized Finnish society? The project is a five-photographer collective exhibition exploring this thematic. Jussi Särkilahti Aapo Huhta Helen Korpak Juuso Westerlund Maria Gallen–Kallela … The village of Liimatavaara in Kainuu is the birthplace of my grandfather. To me its lakes and forests epitomise the Finnish landscape as well as the quiet mentality so often attributed to our culture. In order to pay respect to this stillness, I chose to travel by foot around Kainuu's capital, Kajaani, slowly documenting the people and places that presented themselves to me. It felt like the best way to see – with no clear destination and a slow means of transport, one tends to focus on surroundings and on one’s internal experience in a more corporeal way. To me this relates strongly with Walking by Henry Thoreau. Traveling by foot connects a man not only with trees and stones and sunsets, but also with himself and with other people, strangers, who seem to become more familiar with each and every step.