Eija-Liisa Ahtila

The Finnish artist Eija-Liisa Ahtila (f. 1959) has manifested her role as one of the most important videoartists of today on an international scale. Her works have been presented at museums all over the world, and the works on show in Aalborg, “The House” and “The Hour of Prayer”, attracted much attention when they were presented at the Documenta in Kassel and at the Biennale in Venice.

Today Eija-Liisa Ahtila lives in Helsinki. Since the mid-1990s Eija-Liisa Ahtila has worked with multi-screen installations, letting different aspects of the story take place simultane¬ous, surrounding the observer in the exhibition space.

The Hour of Prayer (2005) The main theme of the work is death and loss. We follow the story of the main character´s dog, Luca Boy, dying of bone cancer. The story is not told in chronological sequences but switches back and forth in time and between different locations.

The House (2002) This three-screen installation tells the story of a woman´s mental breakdown, for which the destruction of the house is a metaphor. It begins as a seemingly realistic descrip¬tion of a country house. But later on reality shows its instability - insecurity and alienation sneaks up.

The exhibion run from the 14th of March - 17th of May 2009

The exhibition is produced by The Museum of Finnish Archicteture.