Material
Freezer, black paint, ice

The freezer connotes Lapland as a dark and cold object.

The idea is to use an existing object, a ready-made to distort the original use. During the journey, information has been recorded. This piece is the black box of my experience.

Material
Artifact 1: Reindeer toy: reindeer fur, birch, polyester fiber wadding
Artifact 2: Ear protectors: reindeer fur covered ear protectors
Artifact 3: Eye mask: reindeer fur, wool, polyester fiber wadding

Dimensions
Artifact 1: 75 x 50 x 23
Artifact 2: 15 x 20 x 9
Artifact 3: 18 x 8 x 4

For a long time Lapland has been losing it’s population for cities in Southern Finland. People have been moving away for work and education and they have been losing their contact with their own culture. This happens when young people are trying to adopt the new living habits and integrate into new cultures. Radical change of moving out from home environment to novel surroundings can cause homesickness, anxiety and depression.

Work is series of objects that allows people who have moved away from Lapland to hectic and urban surroundings to treat these problems. These fictional objects for treating homesickness could help users to experience Lapland by simulating stereotypical Lappish atmospheres and natural conditions. Created artifacts could also help people to memorize home and help to remind where their real cultural roots are. These fictional products also suggests that Lappish people should openly express their cultural roots and be brave of them.

Material
Styrofoam and latex paint

Material
Mixed Media

»Memory is the diary that we all carry about with us.« (Oscar Wilde)

This installation tells the story of my northern experience. The memories I keep from the journey are contained in 89 glass jars. Each element composing those memories have been inventoried in a periodic table, inspired from the Mendeleïev’s original one. Thanks to that classification, the memories have been quantified, by their theoretical molecular mass and relative density.

Material
Book and various ingredients

Memories, opinions and expectations motivate the resulting outcome of this recipe book. The validity of culture and tradition and why we carry it down crosses so many grey areas that it was only through food that I found a convincing purpose and rational. The recipe book is a parody on traditional Finnish food, but the content revolves around recipes from foreign people who have tried to recreate some tastes and memories from home whilst living here.

In the search for ingredients, sometimes we end up compromising, substituting or modifying. Like how traditional food first came about, we basically live of the land, live of what is available to us, and that still happens in this very age. We all have our own opinions of cultures and more so of our own. After some test tastes, I realized it was pointless for me to work on traditional Finnish food, especially since I have no roots in it. The recipes thus also serve as very personal viewpoints and approaches of different people with their own cultural background, making something for themselves, meeting their own expectations and recreating from memory the taste and flavours of home.

In between you will find quotes from Finnish people about their impressions and opinions of food in other cultures based on their first hand experiences in those countries. This interplay of viewpoints and perspectives bring together this recipe book in a satirical manner, especially with regards to the concept of tradition. Along with the recipe book is a small installation of my own take on Finnish food and the ingredients that make up the basis of Finnish food in varying proportions. Nothing claims to be factually accurate but act as a reflection of this personal perspective.

In agreement with Brillat-Savarin, ‘Tell me what you eat, and I will tell you who you are.’ Food is really such a strong reflection of our identity, origin and modus operandi. Tradition or not, it is our own personal acceptance and connection to the food that really validates it’s existence.

Technique
Mixed Media

Material
Fake fur, acrylics

Dimensions
150 cm x 100 cm

The Industrial design program of the Aalto University’s School of Art and Design made me do it.

Material
Mixed Media

This project was inspired by the emptiness of Lapland and its isolating character.

Today’s world demands its citizens to play an active role in different kinds of communities, react and follow up on everything that happens in our surroundings. We are reachable by diverse means of communication 24/7. E-mails are read several times a day, the mobile phone is always with us. At the same time, we are connected to Facebook or other social networks.

When we get home from work, we switch on television, computer and radio. We are drowning in the social noise surrounding us. Even during the holidays many people report having problems with disconnecting from work—because they of course took with them the mobile phone and laptop.

DisconnectedHolidays.com is the sweetest escape from the everyday life cycle. It is a service that helps you to disconnect from the things that stress you.

You can send your mobile phone, laptop or calendar away for a certain period of time. By doing so, you disconnect from the rest of the world and concentrate on yourself and your loved ones.

First you order a special posting package. Then place the object into the package, and write your own address on it. Now bring it to the next post office.

After a few days you will get your package back.

Technique
Hand sewing

Material
Lamb and reindeer leather, thread

Rihmasto is a combination of playfulness, experimentation and love for natural materials. It started with exploration of the leather material: its characteristics, feeling and uses. By trying different shapes and treatments, an idea began to form. The end result is a series of decorative leather objects, inspired by nature, delicateness and randomness.

Scale model

Material
Spruce

Dimensions
ca. 225x75x65cm

»The biggest undiscovered potential of being in the periphery is the liberation from the established consensus.« M. Jørgensen in Northern Experiments, The Barents Urban Survey 2009

Dominating the skyline of Arkhangelsk, a city in Russia’s far northwest, the 13-story Sutyagin house is believed to be the world’s tallest wooden house. Constructed by Nikolai P. Sutyagin over 15 years (starting in 1992), without formal plans or a building permit, the structure deteriorated while he spent a few years in prison. Condemned by the city as a fire hazard, the house was pulled down in spring 2009. This model is a replica based on the few remaining pictures found on the Internet.

More info on vincentvergain.blogspot.com

Technique
Digital photography

Material
Inkjet print

Dimensions
100 x 66cm, 4pcs

3 coffee tables

Material
Wood, concrete

Dimensions
2 tables ca. 50 x 32 x 40 cm
1 table ca. 40 x 27 x 40 cm

These coffee tables have been inspired by the Finnish wooden mug »kuksa«. It is a typical handicraft from Lapland. My aim was to transfer the qualities embodied in the »kuksa« to another object. Essentially, the kuksa changes with usage and especially with what you drink from it. This process makes it unique and personal.

On one table, I poured coffee and left the mark. Usually, this would be considered as spoiling it. Yet, it was done on purpose and therefore becomes part of the regular production process.

Another table was used to prepare one cup of coffee with it.

The third table has a concrete table top that has been treated with coffee.