The Viikki traffic circle in Helsinki is the stage of Twig Hummer built from timber, twigs and cardboard. The environmental artwork by Ilkka Karhu is the artist’s Master of Art diploma project at the Aalto University School of Art and Design. The real-sized, 4-metre-long humoristic work is meant to make a statement and stimulate discussion about environmental values, as well as to bring passers-by joy at this busy traffic intersection.

 

Karhu has wished to bid farewell to the gas-guzzling Hummer SUV by turning it into a comic figure. His artwork is a comment on the global environmental crisis and lifestyles relying on wasteful driving. The site, allocated to the artwork by the City of Helsinki, is an entrance point to Helsinki’s Viikki district, which is strongly characterized by ecological development and lifestyles.

 

The Viikki district is home to another environmental artwork. A 5-metre-tall sculpture of a gorilla made from used car tyres sits in front of the Korona library complex at the Viikki campus of the University of Helsinki. The work titled Kaikki on mahdollista (“Everything is possible”) is by Estonian artist Villu Jaanisoo.

 

Jaanisoo’s artwork is the winner of an environmental art competition organized by the State Art Collection of The Arts Council of Finland. The jury cites Jaanisoo’s work as a timely statement about consumption, recycling, environmental protection and animals’ rights. The artist says, “I have sought to express ecological aspects that have to do with changes in our living environment and threatened species.” The Viikki campus of the University of Helsinki is dedicated to biosciences including veterinary science.

 

The winner of an environmental-art student workshop at the Aalto University School of Art and Design is a proposal for lighting in the “Baana” former railway corridor, which is being built into a pedestrian and bicycling passageway from Ruoholahti to Finlandia Park – from a former port site under redevelopment to the Helsinki city centre.

 

The Baana proposal by Kaisa Salmi, M.A., illuminates each of the seven bridges crossing the corridor with an intense colour produced by LED lights. Salmi comments that the coloured, illuminated bridges help people to visualize the area and create both feelings of safety and artistic impressions.