The Thin Line Between the Power to Destroy and Recover

Tuhon Tiellä The Thin Line Between the Power to Destroy and Recover The Thin Line Between the Power to Destroy and Recover View all images ↓
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Through her colorful pictures taken between Finland and Belgium, Oona Oikkonen proposes a new gaze through which to understand environmental concerns, depicting landscapes and portraits of activists her series hints at a chance to change for the better. 

Humanity has lost the brakes and gone mad in speed and growth and is no longer politically able to stop devolution. Sea levels are rising, heat waves are occurring and ecosystems are collapsing. If people can destroy the Earth, they can also help to rebuild it. 

I started to photograph the series in Lapland, Finland in February 2020 and continued to work on it in Helsinki and Antwerp. In the beginning stillness, loneliness and emptiness were clearly present. During Autumn 2020 I started photographing climate activists, together we explored and questioned the surroundings and we thought of new ways of seeing the world in which we stand. I collected texts from these young climate activists, and being inspired by them, I continued photographing the Tuhon Tiellä series. 

Words and Pictures by Oona Oikkonen. 

Oona Oikkonen is an artist and photographer based between Helsinki and Antwerp. Oikkonen captures light through colors, seeking to blur boundaries within our perception. The main ingredients in her work are the power of individuality, nature, human beings from all spheres, and their behavior, all photographed in a colorful, sensual, and cinematic way. Follow her on Instagram and PhMuseum. 

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This feature is part of Story of the Week, a selection of relevant projects from our community handpicked by the PhMuseum curators.