Small Epics: The Works of Salla Tykkä

Presented in association with Art Star 3: Video Art Biennial (Ottawa)

Curated by Jason St-Laurent

Friday, July 27, 2007 at 8:00 pm

With our freshly expanded media mandate, Gallery TPW is pleased to present our first one-night-only film screening.

Small Epics is the first survey of film and video work by noted Finnish artist Salla Tykkä in Canada. This special summer screening features her critically acclaimed trilogy, Cave, and the Canadian premiere of her newest work ZOO. Helsinki based Tykkä first gained international notoriety at the 2001 Venice Biennale. She has since had exhibitions at the Kiasma Museum of Contemporary Art (Helsinki), the Centre Pompidou (Paris), the Walker Art Center (Minneapolis) and she is represented by Galerie Yvon Lambert (New York).

Acting as condensed epics, the experience of watching Tykkä’s shorts is an emotional journey. Overpowering soundtracks and lush cinematography accompany cryptic narratives and subdued performances. Her works at once conflate and deflate the conventions and mechanics of cinema as her film language borrows, then subverts, the manipulative strategies of commercial filmmaking. Central to Tykkä’s films are considerations of modernism, the female condition and the power of cinema.

Join us for this special summer event with curator Jason St-Laurent in attendance. A discussion about Tykkä’s work and the media arts in Finland will follow the screening.

The Program:

My Hate is Useless, Video, 5 minutes, 1996

Power, 16mm, 4:15 minutes, 1999

Lasso, DigiBeta / 35mm, 3:45 minutes, 2000

Thriller, DigiBeta / 35mm, 8 minutes, 2001

Cave, DigiBeta / 35mm, 9:58 minutes, 2003

Zoo, DigiBeta / 35mm, 12:26 minutes, 2006

Salla Tykkä is presented in association with Art Star 3: Video Art Biennial (Ottawa) and Galerie SAW Gallery (Ottawa). Screening equipment is generously donated by the Inside Out Toronto Lesbian and Gay Film and Video Festival. Special thanks to AV-arkki (Distribution Centre for Finnish Media Art) and the Finnish Film Foundation.

Add Your Comments

Your email address will not be published.

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Curator Biography

Jason St-Laurent is an artist and curator based in Toronto. As a curator, he has presented more than 50 projects in Canada, South Africa, Mexico, Finland and Estonia. St-Laurent is also the founding curator of the biennial ELECTRIC FIELDS: Electronic Music and Media Forum in Ottawa. He is currently the Director of Programming for the Inside Out Toronto Lesbian and Gay Film and Video Festival.