Bio
Henna Herranen (b.1988) is a Helsinki-based visual artist working with mixed media, mainly video and writing. At the moment she studies everyday horror, borderlines of the body and her relationship with dogs and other non-human. She works on her thesis in the Master’s Degree Programme of Visual Cultures, Curating and Contemporary Art at Aalto University.
Artist Statement
I draw my body with a camera, moving on borders which are portraying me, wondering where is the furthest line of myself, how far do I extend, am I leaking over the edge, turning into something else. I’m pixels and flesh, electricity and fur, a mirror image.
My works involve autofictional and mundane body horror elements but also curious trips in my environment and other dreamy and nightmarish landscapes. I portray the body and the identity in transformation and escaping the ideal of wholeness. I also try to make connections with non-human animals, other beings and things. My hand is often the protagonist, behind or in front of the lense, petting and mashing stuff. Monsters, otherness in the familiar, and varying personas of oneself are lurking in the scenes of my videos.There’s something appealing in the monstrous, it destabilizes and questions borders and norms, reveals weakness and fluidity in them. Usually I am the monster of my works. Or then they’re my works which are the monsters of mine.
I use the nearest tools I have, cameras of a smartphone and a laptop. It’s economical and practical to use these lo-fi techniques, but they also provide important meanings and aesthetics. They connote everyday life, social media and communication, and the cyborg-ish human. Since my current themes are leading me to haptic perspective and multisensory worlds, I’m planning to start working again with ceramics and sculpting, which I studied earlier in the bachelor degree. Writing and drawing are the basics I do everyday besides taking photos and recording video. An experimental and intuitive mindset towards working is my guideline angel. To be gentle is the hardest.
hennakaroliina.herranen@gmail.com
vimeo.com/hennaherranen
