The Alvar Aalto Museum’s spring season opens with visual artist and architect Ulla-Maija Alanen’s Human Space. The exhibition is based on a study of the architecture of anatomy and the anatomy of architecture, with intriguing photographic works that let viewers look into the underwater world, the human body and architectural space. The exhibition will be open to the public at the Alvar Aalto Museum Gallery in Jyväskylä, February 7–March 30, 2014.

The photographic works combine images from architecture and medicine with underwater photographs. In her collages Alanen juxtaposes images of the structures of the human body and its bone and muscle systems with, for example, a classical portrayal of a column. In the exhibition the interior of the human body and the body’s interactions with the material world coalesce into a unified whole.

“When we step into Human Space we walk into our own internal landscape. Architectural space and the body’s space merge into one, while our body’s space takes on a new dimension when our internal landscapes, structures and proportions are shown to us as allegories and metaphors for architecture,” is how Alanen describes the theme of the exhibition.

Ulla-Maija Alanen: The resonance of water, 2013
Pigment print on silver rag, 29 x 29 cm

Water is an underlying element in Alanen’s exhibition as a whole. In her works she investigates water’s healing and rejuvenating effects. Water is also seen as our first home. Alanen’s photographs taken under water constitute a return to this primordial home, while at the same time resonating with the black-and-white, fluid landscapes of MRI image.

Ulla-Maija Alanen is a Helsinki-based visual artist and architect, whose artistic production has been shown in Finland and abroad. She is known for her façade projections commenting on urban space. Alanen is also active in cultural work with the elderly.

The exhibition has been supported by the Alfred Kordelin Foundation and the Arts Promotion Centre Finland.

Ulla-Maija Alanen will be available to meet the media at the Alvar Aalto Museum on Thursday, February 6.

The exhibition will be officially opened on Thursday, February 6 at 18:00. Welcome!

For further information about Ulla-Maija Alanen and the Human Space exhibition see
the Alvar Aalto Museum website.

A catalogue has also been produced about the exhibition.

Further information and password for press photo:
Producer Mari Forsberg, +358 (0)45 6790920, mari.forsberg(a)alvaraalto.fi, Alvar Aalto Museum

Press Photos