Tables of Thought, Helsinki 28-29/4/10, is an exhibition and symposium organised by the Finnish Academy of Fine Arts and the European Artistic Research Network (EARN). The exhibition takes place in the gallery of the Finnish Academy of Fine Arts (Kuvagalleria). Participating artists include: Maria Finn, Daniel Jewesbury, Susan Pui San Lok, Katrin von Maltzahn, Lauren O’Neal, Michael Stevenson, Nina Temporaer and Lars Wallsten. The artists will discuss the displayed research during the symposium on April 28th and 29th.

The programme will open with a screening of Susan Hiller’s The Last Silent Movie. Denise Robinson, Tim Stott, Janine Marchessault and Ekateria Degot will provide critical and contextual presentations, and artists Jeremiah Day and Johan Thom will make performative interventions during the symposium.

Tables of Thought has been developed by Jan Kaila and Henk Slager, and focuses on the paradoxical tension within current debates on artistic research between the urge for disciplinary knowledge and the constant subversion of this by artistic thinking. The exhibition and symposium programme of Tables of Thought plays both with the taxonomic impulse integral to disciplinary practices and with the mercurial and destabilising flows of artistic thinking and research.

Tables of Thought is part of an ongoing and unique trans-European experiment in arts research organised by EARN in association with Centrifugal and led by GradCAM, Ireland. This second phase of the project builds upon, and extends, the examination and critical contestation of the archival paradigm in artistic research and curatorial practice initiated at the exhibitions Critique of Archival Reason (curated by Henk Slager, RHA Gallery, Dublin, 2010) and Re: Public (curated by Daniel Jewesbury, TBG, Dublin, 2010) which were held in conjunction with the conference Arts Research: Publics and Purposes (http://www.gradcam.ie/art_research_public.php, Dublin, February 2010).

The Helsinki phase of the Artist as Citizen project is co-organised by the Finnish Academy of Fine Arts in collaboration with EARN (European Artistic Research Network) and associated partners including: The Finnish Academy of Fine Arts (Helsinki), GradCAM (Dublin), MaHKU (Utrecht Graduate School of Visual Art and Design), Malmo Art Academy (Malmo), Slade School of Fine Art (London), Sint-Lukas Brussels University College of Art and Design, Universita IUAV (Venice), Academy of Fine Arts (Vienna), University of Gothenburg and The School of Fine Art (Leeds). Further phases of the project will take place in Brussels (Sint-Lukas) and Zagreb (Centrifugal) in summer 2010.

EARN (European Artistic Research Network) was established in 2004 and exists to share and exchange knowledge and experience in artistic research; foster mobility, exchange and dialogue among art researchers; promote wider dissemination of artistic research; and enable global connectivity and exchange for artistic research.

Tables of Thought will also see the launch of EARN’s new website resource for artistic research http://www.artresearch.eu 



This project is in part funded by the EC-EACEA Culture 2000–2007: Artist as Citizen project coordinated by Mick Wilson (GradCAM, Dublin).


Location: Finnish Academy of Fine Arts, Kaikukatu 4, Helsinki, Finland.

For more information: http://www.kuva.fi or henri.wegelius(at)kuva.fi

See also http://www.e-flux.com/shows/view/7975