Interviews
Trans*Creative interview series with artists and cultural producers
Trans*Creative interview series consists of ten interviews with trans and non-binary artists and cultural producers living in Finland. The longer versions of the video interviews can be listened to as podcast episodes. The planning of the series was carried out in the project’s working croup.
The interviews will be published in two clusters, the first of which was released in February 2023. The rest of the interviews will released in 2024. The initial interviews, filmed and recorded in 2022, were designed and conducted by Lotta Kähkönen and Jamie MacDonald. Filming, sound recording, and editing are done by Mira Eskelinen. The signature tune is composed by Kuutti Kiperä.
ENNI KALILAINEN
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Enni Kalilainen is a visual artist, art instructor, and queer- and trans activist. Central themes in her artworks are queer identity, the formation of self, empowerment, love, and encountering. Her sculptors have been exhibited, for example, in WAM: Turku City Art Museum’s group exhibition (Spectrum, 2021), B Gallery’s group exhibition (Trans Take Over, 2021), and in Loukko Gallery’s solo exhibition (I did this for you, 2021). The works included in the Spectrum exhibition are presented in a video here (opens in a new tab). Kalilainen is also a skateboarder, an association activist, and one of the founders of Siblings Helsinki (opens in a new tab), a skateboarding community for LGBTQ+ people, which focuses on community building and empowering gender and sexual minorities in skateboarding. She has competed in skateboarding at home and abroad and developed a more equal and inclusive Finnish skateboarding culture, participating in this discussion as an openly trans person.
Listen to the entire interview as a podcast episode here (opens in a new tab).
KAURI SORVARI
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Kauri Sorvari is a professional performer (opens in a new tab), who has wide-ranging experience in the fields of contemporary dance, dance film, theatre, music theatre, community arts, and participatory performance art. He also has experience in teaching, facilitating workshops, and choreographic work. Sorvari’s work draws from versatile education in vocal training, dance, improvisation, and movement and practice that utilizes the perception of one’s own body. They work in the free field of dance and theatre, and they have performed among other things in the musical The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert (Helsinki City Theatre), and A Short Episode in the Universal History of the Mushroom Civilization (Espoo City Theatre – The International Theatre of Finland). Together with Vilma Tihilä, he's working on a dance film trilogy that delves into multiple identities of self.
Listen to the entire interview as a podcast episode here (opens in a new tab).
ELEANOR SAITTA
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Eleanor Saitta is a painter, photographer, larper, and cultural producer. She also makes a vocation of understanding how complex systems and stories operate, redesigning them to work better. She lives at The Attic, which works as a venue for queer performance art, comedy, music, activism, etc. Saitta is a co-producer of The Attic Underground (opens in a new tab) variety show, which offers a space for queer performance art and discussions between queer artists. The goal is to create room for acts that are personal, experimental, or push the boundaries in ways that don’t fit in commercial venues.
Listen to the entire interview as a podcast episode here (opens in a new tab).
H-P LEHKONEN
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H-P Lehkonen is an international comics artist and climate activist. He also studies social sciences, is actively involved in the Finnish Comics Society, gives guest lectures on how to draw comics, and creates custom info-comics. In his comics art Lehkonen focuses on climate issues, sustainable and eco-friendly ways of life, recycling, and queer life. His comics have been published in Finnish, English, Swedish, and French. Lehkonen’s comics can be found on his website (opens in a new tab) or through Patreon membership (opens in a new tab).
Listen to the entire interview as a podcast episode here (opens in a new tab).
MIRA ESKELINEN
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Mira Aurelia Eskelinen is a performer, writer, and cultural producer. In her work, she aims to dismantle and expand queer- and trans narratives and carnivalize the absurd notions of gender in society. Her work as a cultural producer (opens in a new tab) focuses on creating temporary communities and building platforms for marginalized queer and trans artists to showcase their art. As a live artist, she has created performances that combine drag, dance, rap, spoken word, and burlesque. Her first novel Aavistus (opens in a new tab)was published in May 2023.
Listen to the entire interview as a podcast episode here (opens in a new tab).