Irma Optimisti
Irma Optimist has for a number of years been a prominent figure in Finnish performance. She has adopted Optimist as a last name to counterbalance the Finnish melancholy. She has presented over 160 performances since 1989 in Finland, USA, Japan, Canada, Germany, Austria, Poland, France, Lithuania, Estonia, Belarus, Romania, Denmark, Sweden, Slovakia, Hungary, Israel, United Kingdom and Ireland.
Irma Optimist is working at the Turku School of Economics and Business Administration as a senior lecturer in Mathematics (PhD), specialized in chaos theory.
Irma Optimist’s performances intend to disturb the logic of science. Part of her work is aimed at disentangling formal language and, in Optimist’s own opinion, a performance is, first and foremost, an intellectual process. Using optimistic mathematics, she wants to restore the symbols of food, love and sexuality, since the body has exploded due to the demand for desire, utility and energy.
-Excerpt from the ELA archives, read more about Irma Optimisti in the archives.
Maurice Blok
Whilst concentrating on sculpting, during my studies, I realized that what occurred before the work was even presented was of as much importance to me as the final piece itself. Subsequently, I started carrying out short experiments in front of a video camera; something that soon became close to what is called performance art. Soon after my work evolved into actual performances, involving setting up and carrying out “actions” that bear aesthetic results in front of physical audiences.
Having worked physically, and using tools, on an object (as a sculptor) it was only natural to bring this to my action pieces too. Although my work is performative I still consider myself remaining with a sculptural attitude . Constructing and deconstructing whilst having some kind of interaction with audience (or not). Naturally, one’s performance art is ordered in a chronological manner, yet the viewer is not aware of this while encountering a performance.
Find out more about Maurice Blok here.