Derby

What do art and sport have to offer each other? The six artists in Derby are inspired by sports culture, and study Seinäjoki’s sports phenomena, collaborating with different communities around sports. An exhibition is born that explores the intersections of art and sport, and what kind of connections contemporary art can produce between diverse people, communities, and fields.

The artists are duo Krister Gråhn & Hannamari Matikainen, Anne Lehtelä,Teemu Mäki, Alina Sinivaara, and Maria Stereo. Kunsthalle Seinäjoki proposed dialogue with local sports clubs, teams, or sports associations as the starting point for each artist’s new work.

The collaborators are:Lakeuden WallRiver SK8boarding, Seinäjoki Football Club SJK, Finnish baseball club Seinäjoen Maila-Jussit,figure skating club Seinäjoen Taitoluistelijat, and the orienteering club Rasti-Jussit. The artists’ approaches are communal, observational, conceptual, and aesthetic. In the exhibition, they take the form of paintings, videos, photographs, sculptures, and installations. The derby spirit is also applied to the display experience by borrowing the visual appearance and architecture from the world of sports.

Derby is a term used in sports, which most often refers to a local match and the meeting of traditionally rivalling teams. The Derby exhibition questions whether art and sport are opposing teams or if they will eventually play for the same goal.