260 proposals from around the world submitted in ANTI Festival’s open call
Media release 9.1.2020
The 19th edition of ANTI – Contemporary Art Festival will take place between 8th and 13th September 2020 in Kuopio, Finland. We invited artists, working in any field, to propose projects that directly engage with the theme of food. The open call was organised between 21st November and 19th December 2019.
We received 260 proposals from 50 different countries.
The result of the open call shows that ANTI Festival, Kuopio, live art and multidisciplinary contemporary art have audiences across the globe, in every continent. Proposals were submitted, besides from several European countries, from the United States and Canada, Columbia and Costa Rica, India and Taiwan, Lebanon and Pakistan, Egypt and South Africa, Australia and New Zealand, among others.
A warm thank you to all the applicants. The festival programme will be released during the spring.
For more information contact Festival Manager Elisa Itkonen, elisa@antifestival.com, +358 50 305 2005.
Karen Spencer: Bread-bed 2004. Photo: Pekka Mäkinen
Newsletter 12/2019
Happy Holidays and New Year 2020!
ANTI Festival sends a big warm thank you for the year 2019 to all our partners, artists, team members, voluntary assistants and audiences! We wish you Happy Holidays and all the best for the year 2020!
During the past year, ANTI Festival worked in several multidisciplinary projects, both local and international, and organised public events in Kuopio throughout the year.
The highlights of the year were:
Finnish Theatre of the Year 2019 Award 11.3.2019. ANTI Festival was the first ever festival winning the prize.
Death Café events 20.3.-16.10.2019: We prepared ourselves to the 2019 festival theme in Death Cafe events organised in collaboration with a local mortician, Kukka- ja hautauspalvelu Rosanna.
10.-15.9.2019 ANTI – Contemporary Art Festival. The 18th festival edition brought together artists and audiences from across Finland and around the world. The programme traced various iterations of death in an attempt to open-up thinking around our relationship to it and to the many sets of phenomena that surround it.
We were proud to present the new Shortlist LIVE! programme as part of the festival. Shortlist LIVE! presented works by the artists shortlisted for ANTI Festival International Prize for Live Art. The highlight of the festival was announcing Dana Michel as the winner of the Prize. Dana Michel will return to Kuopio in 2020 with a new commissioned work.
2.-15.9.2019 Future DiverCities Lab #4 closed the series of Labs curated and organised by ANTI. The Lab set up a pop-up space and meeting point for artists and audiences in the centre of Kuopio.
15.11.2019 the City of Kuopio awarded ANTI Festival with an honorary diploma for “Promoting Internationalization in the City of Kuopio”.
Image above: Terje Isungset (NO): Ice Music 2016. Photo: Pekka Mäkinen.
ANTI Festival 2020 – Call for Proposals closed
The 19th edition of ANTI – Contemporary Art Festival will take place between 8th and 13th September 2020 in Kuopio, Finland. For our 2020 festival ANTI is thrilled to announce partnership with Kuopio Region of Gastronomy, coordinated by ProAgria Eastern Finland and Savonia University.
We invited artists, working in any field, to propose projects that directly engage with the theme of food and received 270 proposals from around the world. Thank you to all the applicants!
Call for proposals on the theme of Food – One week left to Submit!
Newsletter 12.12.2019
The 19th edition of ANTI – Contemporary Art Festival will take place between 8th and 13th September 2020 in Kuopio, Finland. We now invite artists, working in any field, to propose projects that directly engage
with the theme of food.
This year, in addition to the general call-out we have five specific call-outs for commissioned projects. In addition see below for a call, made by our partner Reality Research Center, for applications to the Residency for Impossible Performance initiative.
To submit a proposal for ANTI Festival 2020, read the application guidelines on our website.
The proposal deadline is 19.12.2019 (midnight Finnish time).
For our 2020 festival ANTI is thrilled to announce partnership with Kuopio Region of Gastronomy, coordinated by ProAgria Eastern Finland and Savonia University.
Reality Research Center: Call for Applications
The Residency Program for Impossible Performance is a part of Reality Research Center programme in 2019–2021. Each year an artist will be selected through an open application process. The Artist in Residency will get the resources to produce an “impossible”, unprecedented performance for ANTI – Contemporary Art Festivalin Kuopio, Finland, in September. The program is for artists at the beginning of their career or people with an otherwise utopian agenda who work in performing arts in Finland and who have unfulfilled performative dreams.
The application period for the 2020 residency is open from Nov 21 to Dec 20, 2019. Read what’s on offer plus further instructions from Reality Research Center webpage and submit!
Newsletter 11/2019
ANTI Festival 2020 – Call for proposals on the theme of Food
For our 2020 festival ANTI is thrilled to announce partnership with Kuopio Region of Gastronomy, coordinated by ProAgria Eastern Finland and Savonia University.
The 19th edition of ANTI – Contemporary Art Festival will take place between 8th and 13th September 2020 in Kuopio, Finland. We now invite artists, working in any field, to propose projects that directly engage with the theme of food.
This year, in addition to the general call-out we have five specific call-outs for commissioned projects. In addition see below for a call, made by our partner Reality Research Center, for applications to the Residency for Impossible Performance initiative.
To submit a proposal for ANTI Festival 2020, read the application guidelines on our website. The proposal deadline is 19.12.2019 (midnight Finnish time).
Reality Research Center: Call for Applications
The Residency Program for Impossible Performance is a part of Reality Research Center programme in 2019–2021. Each year an artist will be selected through an open application process. The Artist in Residency will get the resources to produce an “impossible”, unprecedented performance for ANTI – Contemporary Art Festivalin Kuopio, Finland, in September. The program is for artists at the beginning of their career or people with an otherwise utopian agenda who work in performing arts in Finland and who have unfulfilled performative dreams.
The application period for the 2020 residency is open from Nov 21 to Dec 20, 2019. Read what’s on offer plus further instructions from Reality Research Center webpage and submit!
Honorary diploma for Promoting Internationalization
in the City of Kuopio
The City of Kuopio awarded ANTI Festival with an honorary diploma for
“Promoting Internationalization in the City of Kuopio”.
According the City of Kuopio, “ANTI Festival is the most international art festival in Finland, the most significant Finnish festival for contemporary art and performance art. Also, awarding the world’s only Prize for Live Art.”
Artistic Director – Senior Manager Johanna Tuukkanen and Festival Manager Elisa Itkonen received the diploma in an event organised to celebrate the 244 year old City of Kuopio. We warmly thank you for the acknowledgment.
Video postcard from ANTI 2019
The final postcard from ANTI Festival 2019 includes the festival highlights from Saturday 14th September when we experienced performances from the 2019 ANTI Festival International Prize for Live Art shortlisted Dana Michel and Keijaun Thomas, announced Dana Michel as the winner of the Prize and celebrated with good music in an amazing environment!
Postcard from ANTI 2019 Part 4 by Kim Saarinen (Modomo Films) on our Vimeo page!
ANTI Festival 2020 – Call for proposals on the theme of Food
Media release 21.11.2019
For our 2020 festival ANTI is thrilled to announce partnership with Kuopio Region of Gastronomy, coordinated by ProAgria Eastern Finland and Savonia University. The 19th edition of ANTI – Contemporary Art Festival will take place between 8th and 13th September 2020 in Kuopio, Finland. We now invite artists, working in any field, to propose projects that directly engage with the theme of food.
This year, in addition to the general call-out (see below for details) we have five specific call-outs for commissioned projects. In addition see below for a call, made by our partner Reality Research Center, for applications to the Residency for Impossible Performance initiative.
“Food sits at the heart of human civilization. It touches the intensely personal, the national, and the global with equal emphasis. Is there an industry, a field, an activity, a substance with more political, social and economic importance than food? Eating together civilizes us and yet the production of food and its impact on the world’s resources is rapidly endangering the continuation of human life. Every meal we eat is arguably a part of this discourse and yet without difficulty, and with genuine joy, we are able to attribute deep pleasure, sensorial delight and an abundance of feelings of wellbeing, happiness and belonging to the food we surround ourselves with. Food touches every part of our lives, it speaks to sensuality, sexuality, gender, race, class; it forms the background and the foreground to our days, it nourishes and sustains. Food is, as it always has been, a joyful and
complex reminder of our place in this world,”
Artistic Directors Gregg Whelan and Johanna Tuukkanen write.
The 2020 edition of ANTI Festival celebrates Kuopio’s winning nomination as the European Region of Gastronomy 2020. For an introduction to Kuopio’s food producers, street food festivals, restaurants and traditional markets
see this video.
For more information contact Elisa Itkonen, elisa@antifestival.com, +358 50 305 2005.
Image above: Karen Spencer: Bread-bed 2004. Photo: Pekka Mäkinen
Submitting a Proposal for ANTI Festival 2020
When proposing a project to ANTI Festival please make sure your work responds to the festival’s focus on public space (including interior and privately owned spaces). We do not show projects in traditional cultural spaces (galleries, theatres etc.) so your proposed project will need to have an integral relationship with the place in which it is presented and your proposal will need to outline where your work could be located.
The proposal form allows a link to be made to online documentation of previous work and for applicants to attach a CV and a maximum of three supporting images. Proposals that do not strictly conform to these guidelines will not be considered.
We strongly advise you spend some time getting to know ANTI Festival before making an application,
our Vimeo page is a great place to get a sense of past editions of the festival.
Send your proposal by using this electric form. The proposal deadline for all proposals is 19.12.2019 (at 23.59 Finnish time).
We apologize for not being able to react to all of the many questions you are sending us close to the deadline. Please read the application guidelines carefully and submit your application. We will contact you, in January, for additional information if needed.
Areas that your project may respond to may include one or more of the following
(this list is by no means exhaustive):
Food and identity; personal/regional/national
Food and social inequality
Food and environment/ecology
Food and geopolitics
Food and land use
Rural and urban farming
Food and community
Food and belief/spirituality
Cooking; dexterity and creativity
Food and the everyday; feeding the family
Food and celebration
Food and gender
Food and wellbeing
Food and the body; disease, eating disorders, body-shape discourse
Local food/Finnish food/seasonal food
Fast food and delivery services; new economies
For more information, contact Festival Manager Elisa Itkonen, elisa@antifestival.com, +358 50 305 2005.
Fees & Budgeting
Special Commissions
Alongside responding to the above list of potential areas we also invite proposals to respond to the below outlines created in collaboration with our local partners. These outlines are intended to work as springboards – your project may develop and extend the information offered here; we’re interested in finding out how you would work with the given framework – we are particularly interested in process-based works.
Wild Foraging
The green spaces around Kuopio are a rich resource for wild food, visiting the forests and lakes of Finland to fish and forage is deeply embedded in Finnish cultural life. In collaboration with Pro Agria Eastern Finland, coordinators of European Region of Gastronomy Kuopio, we are seeking a project that draws on this rich tradition and engages an audience directly with the activity of foraging. Although foraging is associated with rural spaces urban and sub-urban contexts are also possible locations for the project.
Collaboration with chef Anssi Kantelinen
Anssi Kantelinen, a leading chef, is known for creating innovative vegetarian dishes and being the Top Chef 2015 winner in Finland. Anssi is also a member of the international Chaîne des Rôtisseurs, which as an organization is active in Kuopio. The opportunity here is for an artist to propose a collaboration with Anssi; this could take any form however at its center will be a focus on the act of preparing and presenting food.
Aquaponic Systems
A research group at the University of Eastern Finland, led by Harri Kokko, is currently running a project on aquaponic systems. Aquaponic systems save water, energy and food waste, they are also used in urban farming worldwide. This collaborative platform may offer an opportunity for artists interested in the crossover between art, science and activism.
Kuopio Market Hall – Kuopion kauppahalli
Kuopio’s traditional market hall, located in the city’s main square, represents both the city’s past and its vibrant present tense; it is home to a wealth of local food producers and retailers, and draws a wide range of visitors and shoppers of all ages. See images of the historical building online here.How might an artist work with this space at the center of city life and collaborate with local entrepreneurs and food producers? The intention is that the hall itself will be the location of the commissioned project.
Festival Feasting
We are seeking a project that creates/curates a festival meal, for festival artists and audiences alike; a place to meet and eat together. This may be a one-off event, perhaps to mark the opening, or closing of the festival, or be a daily occurring event. What the food is, how it is sourced, prepared and presented will be central to the project, as will the event of the meal itself; where and how it takes place will be key components of the work.
Please add the title of the special commission on the electronic form, there’s a line for “Are you applying for a special commission project? Which one?”.
Reality Research Center: Call for Applications
The Residency Program for Impossible Performance is a part of Reality Research Center programme in 2019–2021. Each year an artist will be selected through an open application process. The Artist in Residency will get the resources to produce an “impossible”, unprecedented performance for ANTI – Contemporary Art Festivalin Kuopio, Finland, in September. The program is for artists at the beginning of their career or people with an otherwise utopian agenda who work in performing arts in Finland and who have unfulfilled performative dreams.
The application period for the 2020 residency is open from Nov 21 to Dec 20, 2019. Read what’s on offer plus further instructions from Reality Research Center webpage and submit!
Honorary diploma for Promoting Internationalization in the City of Kuopio
The City of Kuopio awarded ANTI Festival with an honorary diploma for “Promoting Internationalization in the City of Kuopio”.
According the City of Kuopio, “ANTI Festival is the most international art festival in Finland, the most significant Finnish festival for contemporary art and performance art. Also, awarding the world’s only Prize for Live Art.”
Artistic Director – Senior Manager Johanna Tuukkanen and Festival Manager Elisa Itkonen (in the photo) received the diploma in an event organised to celebrate the 244 year old City of Kuopio. We warmly thank you for the acknowledgment.
Thank you for the 2019 ANTI Festival
Media release 4.10.2019
The 18th edition of ANTI – Contemporary Art Festival was organised in Kuopio, Finland between 10th and 15th September 2019. The festival brought together artists and audiences from across Finland and around the world. The programme traced various iterations of death in an attempt to open-up thinking around our relationship to it and to the many sets of phenomena that surround it.
Over 10 000 participants attended festival events in Kuopio and over 80 000 people followed ANTI’s posting, images and videos on social media.
A warm thank you to the festival artists, audiences, staff members, volunteers and partners!
ANTI 2019 in images
Our photographer Pekka Mäkinen and videographer Kim Saarinen documented the festival events throughout the festival week.
Photos by Pekka Mäkinen are uploaded to our Best of ANTI 2019 folder on Facebook. Some of the best video clips by Kim Saarinen are already on our Instagram and Vimeo pages.
Uutiskirje 3/2019
Sonya Lindfors Returns to Kuopio
1.-7.4.2019
Galleria Ars Libera | Suokatu 30, Kuopio
The winner of the ANTI Festival International Prize for Live Art Award 2018, Sonya Lindfors, returns to Kuopio as she will start working on her piece for ANTI – Contemporary Art Festival 2019 with a gallery residence in Galleria Ars Libera 1.-7.4.2019. Lindfors is working on a process-like piece, and during her gallery week, titled SOFT LANDINGS, she aims to descend softly into the context of the upcoming work.
Lindfors begins her exploration of the field in Kuopio through encounters: Her idea is to facilitate soft encounters in various forms. According to Lindfors, her agenda is to empower and energize, make room for voices and narrations that are not usually able to be present, and to shake and wobble hegemony. Lindfors is working in Gallery Ars Libera together with dance artist Esete Sutinen 1.-3.4.2019, after which the exhibition will continue until 7.4.
Sonya Lindfors is a Helsinki based artist who works with choreography, community activism and teaching. She is a founding member and artistic director of the UrbanApa art community. UrbanApa is a multidisciplinary community that questions power structures, provides growth platforms for new discourses and feminist artistic practices. In her work, Lindfors problematizes power, existing structures, ways of repetition, and othering. Her series of stage performances; NOIR? (2013), NOBLE SAVAGE (2016) and COSMIC LATTE (2018), focus on issues related to blackness, black body, race and representation. Lindfors wants to create and facilitate anti-racist, feminist platforms in which a festival, performance, publication or workshop can act as a tool for radical, communal dreaming.
Volunteer or Intern at ANTI
We are looking for volunteers to help us in the production of ANTI Festival. Various tasks are available between 3 September – 2 October 2019 and especially during the festival between 10th and 15th September.
We need many helping hands in, for example, assisting and hosting the festival artists, transportation, roadie work and guiding audiences.
Internships in festival production for longer periods are also possible. For more information, contact jyri@antifestival.com.
ANTI Festival is the Finnish Theatre of the Year 2019
ANTI Festival is the Finnish Theatre of the Year 2019
ANTI – Contemporary Art Festival has won the Theatre of the Year 2019 prize awarded by The Association of Finnish Theatres. The winner was chosen by MP Outi Alanko-Kahiluoto (Greens).
Theater of the Year award is a prize awarded by The Association of Finnish Theatres yearly since 1997. The 2019 finalists were Baltic Circle Festival and ANTI – Contemporary Art Festival. The finalists were selected by a jury, whose members were dramaturgist Marie Kajava, curator Hilkka-Liisa Iivanainen and critic and researcher Raija Ojala, who is also the former manager of the last year’s winner Zodiak. – Center for New Dance. With the nominations, the jury wanted to highlight two forerunners of Finnish contemporary theatre and performance, who broaden the concept of theatre with their operational model and existence.
“Unique to Kuopio, Finland and the World”
Outi Alanko-Kahiluoto explains her choice with the exceptionally wide knowledge of the art field and the expertise of artistic leadership of the festival. She also highlights ANTI Festival’s accessibility: “It is a festival that sets the threshold for participation and exposure to art as low as possible. ANTI Festival is an internationally interesting and artistically high-class festival without any elitism or insiderity”.
The prize was awarded for the first time to a festival. It was awarded on March 11 during the Thalia Gala in Theatre Viirus. “ANTI – Contemporary Art Festival presents Kuopio, Finland and the whole world something completely unique and unparalleled,” Alanko-Kahiluoto explains her choice.
The artistic leaders of the ANTI Festival Johanna Tuukkanen and Gregg Whelan rejoice: “We wish to thank all the artists who have presented their work at ANTI Festival, our partners, especially the City of Kuopio for their courage and the people of Kuopio for their curiosity and openness. And of course, we’d like to thank our staff: Elisa who is currently on her maternity leave, Jyri, Suvi, all our interns and the members of the board. Making a festival is collaboration and constant developing, renewing and evaluation of operation. It’s good to continue from here!”
ANTI – Contemporary Art Festival will return to the public spaces of Kuopio for its 18th edition in 2019. The festival will take place between 10th and 15th September 2019 and its theme and focus is death.
Newsletter 2/2019
The Theme of ANTI Festival 2019
The 18th edition of ANTI – Contemporary Art Festival will take place between 10th and 15th September 2019. Once again ANTI is bringing internationally celebrated, award-winning artists from around the world to Kuopio Finland to present their work. The theme and the focus of this year’s festival is death.
ANTI Festival’s artistic directors Johanna Tuukkanen & Gregg Whelan are looking forward to this years festival:
“We’re surprised it’s taken us 18 years to get here. Ideas of death, its impact, its social and cultural standing, its place in human life, its place in all life, has been one of the key drivers behind artistic practice for centuries.
ANTI’s 2019 programme traces various iterations of death across an eclectic range of projects in an attempt to open-up thinking around our relationship to it and to the many sets of phenomena that surround it. Ideas die, eras end, materials become obsolete, things break, technology supersedes itself, places are abandoned, the natural world is destroyed, social and political ideals are overthrown and of course plant, animal and human life is finite. All of the above produce grief in one form or other and all have the power to cause change and not always, and – of course – not necessarily, for the worse; much good, much joy comes from death. As tired ideas die society advances, or at least tries to, and we (sometimes) rejoice.
So how does contemporary art speak to this most contemporary, and ageless, presence in our lives? That’s the central question driving ANTI’s 2019 programme; what new practice, what new experience, new knowledge and new joy can we locate in thinking about and working about death?”
The festival programme will be published
in the spring 2019.
Death Cafe – Coffee, Cake and Discussion about Death
This year’s theme is death and we’ll start to make acquaintance through the international Death Cafe concept. In Kuoleman kahvila / Death Cafe we gather together for coffee and cake to talk about death and dying. Make yourself at home in a cozy atmosphere, express your thoughts and hear other people’s stories. Let’s redefine death from a taboo to a natural topic for discussion! Discussion in Finnish.
Wednesday 20.3. 17.00-19.00
Wednesday 24.4. 17.00-19.00
Wednesday 22.5. 17.00-19.00
Kukka- ja hautauspalvelu Rosanna | Vuorikatu 25, Kuopio
Maximum capacity 20 persons. Booking in advance: production@antifestival.com.
Suvi Koivisto Starts as the New Producer of ANTI Festival
The new producer of ANTI festival has been found! Suvi Koivisto is a cultural producer who graduated from the Humak University of Applied Sciences. Suvi has a wealth of experience in producing corporate events and promotions, and she also has a strong background in volunteering at various cultural events. Suvi will return to Kuopio after eight years and is excited to produce this year’s ANTI festival! In the future, he wants to bring even more culture to the people of Kuopio to see and experience. Welcome Suvi!