Mia Kivinen / Curating

The super power of light art is that it is easily approachable. Much of it has strong content. I'm interested in helping the two meet. The most important thing here is the artist and helping them to get where they want to go, be the tool for it discussion, questions, walks in forest or just a chat about something totally unrelated over a cup of coffee.

I've graduated both as a lighting designer and a curator, thus my choice of art genre was quite obvious. These two educations have helped me to know the possibilities of light in fine art and to understand the necessity of knowing light in order to use it to the fullest.

I do not think light is really different from other mediums of visual arts. It's just better.

Solo curating

In 2021, I curated a DIY-themed light art festival in Orimattila hoods, and a light art exhibition Loistava pinta (glowing surface) for Orimattila Art Museum, about two-dimensional, painting-like light art and it's connections to modern art currents. In 2018, FLASH Voipaala exhibition filled the Voipaala art center with light art and light art workshops. In 2016 I curated the annual Senate square projection artwork of Lux Helsinki, called Images of Joy, where a variety of visual artists of different genres prepared an image to be projected onto the Helsinki Cathedral. I was also one of the successive Lux Helsinki's Lantern Park curators, making it sure the lanterns of my era were even weirder than before.

Group curating

I have organised group installations, public art projects, workshops and exhibitions with Galleria Kandela group since 2007, many of which I was the main curator of. The group was founded to give lighting designers an opportunity to visit the context of fine arts. Most of the exhibitions were in public spaces, like Christmas Lights Calendar, with a new light art piece every day, on the main boulevard of Helsinki. Light Cues was an exhibition in an empty market, to be seen from outside, exhibiting artworks based on design ideas of lighting designers, that never made it to stage.

I was a member of curator teams of the first two FLASH light art biennales in Suomenlinna fortress, Helsinki, in 2017 and 2019. The first biennale explored the borders of light art, which has been an interest of mine for some time, and the second dealt with political light art. Since 2022, I've been a member of the curatorial team of Lux Helsinki light art festival. I also have acted as a consulting curator for light art festivals, helping them find their own way and look.

Special areas of interest 

• Public light art
• Site specific light art
• Light art in non-conventional places
• Combining light art and other art disciplines
• History of light art
• Finnish light art
• Political light art
• Light art concepts
• Writing about light art

Social media

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/miakivinen/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/mia.kivinen.1
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/m.kivinen
Blog: helloimatourist.blogspot.com

Writings

• Light in their bones. An article about artists with background in lighting design. In Humalisto & al (ed): 360 degrees: focus on lighting design. University of Arts 2019. https://helda.helsinki.fi/bitstream/handle/10138/301866/TeaK_70.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y
• Ihmeellistä ja hämmästyttävää (Magical and Amazing), MA thesis about light art, what it is, what it is not and where does the stigma come from. In Finnish. University of Arts 2018. https://drive.google.com/file/d/1F-uD0xBgo-HH4HvqtsJBG1U7OQf2uVhv/view?usp=sharing
• Valo paikan näyttäjänä (Light showing places) in Suomalaisen mediataiteen ensimmäinen vuosisata (The First Century of Finnish Media Art) Anthology. Parvs 2023.

Possibilities to travel: Freelancer, thus flexible schedules. Strongly prefers traveling on ground.