IHME Helsinki Commissions

Our Commissions Combine Art, Science and Climate Work

The annual IHME Helsinki Commission is open to everyone and free of charge. A work tailored to a public space is created from a dialogue between art and researched knowledge. IHME works are often situational or place-related, and over the years they have been marveled at in the tram, at the health center, in Vantaa’s Mätäoja neighborhood park, as well as in Yle Areena.

Internationally recognized and awarded artists who share our ethos of ecological sustainability and the power of art in the sustainability transition are chosen as the creators of the commission. You can experience many kinds of emotions with art, and art has the power to change thinking and action. A large number of multidisciplinary partners from home and abroad often participate in the realization of the commissions. The commissions can also be realized in the artist’s home country.

IHME Helsinki works are often participatory, in which case the role of the audience in the work is central. Check out the upcoming work and come along!

This Year’s Commission

Cooking Sections. Two men standing in front of a black wooden wall.

Cooking Sections: Daniel Fernández Pascual and Alon Schwabe. Photo: Aman Askarizad.

IHME Helsinki Commission 2024

Maaleipä Challenge

The artist duo Cooking Sections – Daniel Fernández Pascual and Alon Schwabe – will be making IHME Helsinki Commission 2024. Cooking Sections started in London in 2013 and since their inception they have been examining the systems that organise the world through food. They will carry out their IHME Helsinki Commission as part of their CLIMAVORE project. Cooking Sections’ IHME Helsinki Commission 2024 Maaleipä Challenge will promote soil and water health by announcing a national challenge that is open to everyone. It challenges bakers, home cooks, bakeries, grassroots organisations and restaurants to develop future bread recipes and bake breads that take into consideration soil and gut health.

IHME Helsinki Commission 2024

In the end, I was left with a hopeful feeling that all of us together can bring about a change before it’s too late.

Audience feedback for To Burn, Forest, Fire ceremonies in 2021

Very peaceful, I felt that I wanted to dive into the unknown world of the sea. Very inspiring.

Audience feedback for Jana Winderen’s IHME Helsinki Commission 2020, Listening Through The Dead Zones, in summer 2021.

A very inspiring course – one of the best one I’ve taken in my degree. Such a great opportunity to learn first-hand from Amar and the other teachers.

Course feedback for Amar Kanwar’s IHME Helsinki Commission 2022, Learning From Doubt online course, in 2022.

It immediately gave me the feeling that something is possible here and, at the same time, it’s like, how does this work, where are the instructions for use?

Audience feedback for Hiwa K’s IHME Helsinki Commission 2023, Chicago Boys – While We Were Singing, They Were Dreaming, in 2023.

Previous Commissions

Image of a group of people smiling, laughing and waving hands high together at the final public rehearsal of Chicago Boys - While We Were Singing, They Were Dreaming in the theatre hall of Stoa Cultural Centre. The group is standing and sitting on colorful persian carpets. Behind them is a screened text saying IHME Helsinki Commission 2023 Chicago Boys - While We Were Singing, They Were Dreaming 17.4. - 27.5.2023.

IHME Helsinki Commission 2023 Chicago Boys – While We Were Singing, They Were Dreaming happened in Helsinki during 15 April and 27 May 2023. Photo: Tomi Tähti.

IHME Helsinki Commission 2023

Hiwa K: Chicago Boys – While We Were Singing, They Were Dreaming

In IHME Helsinki Commission 2023 Chicago Boys – While We Were Singing, They Were Dreaming a diverse group of people formed an amateur band and practiced together twice a week for six weeks between 17 April and 27 May 2023. The band consisted of musicians and non-musicians who are united by the desire to play music and to think about the connections between the neoliberal economy and environmental changes to everyday life.

IHME Helsinki Commission 2023

Screenshot of Amar Kanwar’s IHME Helsinki 2022 Commission, Learning from Doubt online course’s log in page.

IHME Helsinki Commission 2022

Amar Kanwar: Learning from Doubt

The IHME Helsinki Commission 2022 Learning from Doubt by artist, film maker Amar Kanwar was an online, ten-week educational course based on and emerging from Kanwar´s art installation and exhibition The Sovereign Forest. Lessons learned from experiments on ecological sustainability with a unique rice seed bank in the village of Narisho in Odisha, India and the experiences gained during the making and exhibiting of The Sovereign Forest were integrated into the course.

IHME Helsinki Commission 2022

Image of Katie Paterson, a woman with blond mid-length hair standing outside in a park, smiling and holding a cup of three incense sticks in her hands, facing towards the camera.

Katie Paterson, photo: Veikko Somerpuro

IHME Helsinki Commission 2021

Katie Paterson: To Burn, Forest, Fire

To Burn, Forest, Fire consisted of the scent of the first-ever forest on earth and the scent of the last forest of the age of climate crisis, made into incense and then burned across a variety of sites around the city of Helsinki in 1-30 September and 1 October, 2021.

IHME Helsinki Commission 2021

Image of a rowing stadium in Helsinki in a sunny day. Four big loud speakers are facing the stadium and behind them is a sea view glimmering in sun.

Listening Through the Dead Zones could be experienced at the Helsinki rowing stadium. Photo: Veikko Somerpuro.

IHME Helsinki Commission 2020

Jana Winderen: Listening Through the Dead Zones

IHME Helsinki 2020 commission Listening Through the Dead Zones was a site-specific sound installation by the Norwegian artist Jana Winderen, in collaboration with Tony Myatt, at the Rowing Stadium in Helsinki.

IHME Helsinki Commission 2020

History

Why did IHME change its operations?

From a festival into a contemporary art commissioning agency.

Read our story