Making Environmental Art Together: a Study on Applied Visual Arts through the Enontekiö Art Path Project

Abstract

This study aims to examine the practice of applied visual arts. It observes the process and results of the Enontekiö Art Path project and discuss the project from the perspective of aesthetics. The project is an environmental and community art project, which was a collaboration between the municipality of Enontekiö and the University of Lapland. The project started in 2016 and ended in 2018 while having six workshops in various villages including Hetta, Vuontisjärvi, Palojärvi, Karesuvanto and Kilpisjärvi. There were two students’ groups at different times. This paper discusses four workshops of the second project team in which the author participated. The aim of the project was to make environmental art with the locals in small villages in Enontekiö, to bring people together and help them to appreciate their communities and finally to influence the wellbeing of the community.

This thesis analyses the following questions:1) how can the Enontekiö Art Path project affect and be affected by the aesthetics of Enontekiö? 2) what are the challenges and strengths in the Enontekiö Art Path project? 3) how to develop the practice of applied visual arts in northern Finland. The research utilises art-based action research as a methodological framework. It is a open and critical working method which gives a best tool to research a contextual, processbased and dialogical project.

The results of this study show that considering aesthetics in art practices helps people to appreciate their communities. Art practices, influenced by the aesthetics of a place, can be a good foundation to increase the sense of community and to have sustainable social impact on communities. The workshops in the project were inspired by local aesthetic qualities, which made the project present the characterstics of Enontekiö. The project demonstrates that the continuous engagement of the locals is critical during the whole process. Staying long term in villages and visiting numerous times are emphasised to increase the local involvement. Applying intercultural and multicultural approaches to the process brings the mutual interests from the local community and the project team. The significance of educational and pedagogical accesses to art practices in practical ways was pointed out in the study.