Härmä / Hoar

My late grandmother (1925–2019) lived alone in the Finnish countryside. She had early-stage Alzheimer’s disease and a trail cam was installed in her yard to keep her safe. The series consists of images taken by this motion-sensing camera.

My grandmother lived to be 94 years old (1925–2019). She wished to live also the last years of her life alone in her home in the countryside in Ylihärmä, Finland. The house is located kilometers away from the nearest town.

She had early-stage Alzheimer’s disease, which is why she occasionally imagined that strangers visited the yard or the basement. A motion-sensing surveillance camera was installed to ensure that the intruders would be detected. Eventually, the camera ended up monitoring my grandmother instead.

I first saw the surveillance camera images after my grandmother had already passed away. Working with them took me closer to her and made me understand how she lived. In them, my grandmother does repetitive yard work in the twilight of her life until she no longer appears in the pictures. The yard, however, is not emptied, but life after human presence continues.