Tailwinds for audiovisual culture

One of the projects we supported in February was a video series consisting of the works Bálvvosbáiki, Sieidi and Nuppi bealde by Sámi musician Ánnámáret and media artist Marja Viitahuhta. The series focuses on the relationship between image and sound, especially yoik, and the nature and environment of Sápmi.

The video works of the project, which started in 2019, aim to visualise the ideas and themes of the yoiks by engaging in a dialogue with the yoik and the musical gestures that intertwine with it.

For example, Bálvvosbáiki considers where a place of worship could be found today. According to the Sámi way of thinking, humans are one with the whole environment. Therefore, the whole environment may be a place of worship. In the video, Ánnámáret’s yoik is accompanied by detailed close-ups of plants on the one hand and expansive fell landscapes on the other.

“Through audiovisual means, we aim to portray an inner experience that is difficult to put into words but which combines deep meaning, a feeling of searching and a different sense of time – or lack of it – when spending long periods of time in nature,” Viitahuhta and Ánnámáret say.

Photo: Marja Viitahuhta and Ánnámáret.