Group exhibition in Oksasenkatu11, Helsinki (FI) 2026 

The works explore the ways in which the body is hidden in language, objects, and everyday forms, and how familiar wordscan acquire new meanings when their unnoticed physical or linguistic connections are brought to the surface. Here, the body appears in unexpected places. It is embedded in the vocabulary we use every day, folded into the pages of books, and assembled from the parts of ordinary objects. What initially seems abstract, inanimate, or purely functional gradually reveals a physical presence. A footnote has a foot, a book page grows an ear, while the leg of a chair, belly of a pot, tongue of a shoe, or nose of a teapot can become parts of an unfamiliar body.

The works are connected by an interest in catachresis–terms used in an unusual or strained way because no more precise term exists, such as the head of the needle, or the face of a clock. They draw attention to the strange and often overlooked ways in which language borrows from the body in order to describe the world. At the same time, the works allow objects, words, and fragments to acquire bodies of their own.

Curator: Lauri Antti Mattila
The exhibition was supported by Kone Foundation and Finnish Cultural Foundation Uusimaa.