19
Kallio Block Party is without a doubt one of the greatest and biggest events that I have had a part in organising. Kallio Block Party has been organised by Kallio movement since 2011. The movement is a politically and religiously independent collective formed by the people who live, work or otherwise spend time in or nearby the neighbourhood of Kallio in Helsinki.
Kallio Block Party combines music and street art and creates an alternate reality and vision of what the city could be, if its streets were just for the people. This event is the biggest street party in Finland, and every year attracts thousands of people to the streets of Kallio.
Hundreds of volunteers have been organising Kallio Block Party during its existence. I was especially involved in itin 2012 and 2013, but also some years after that. Kallio movement is mostly known for Kallio Block Party, but it organises also a lot of other fun and important stuff.
15
Helsinki Urban Art is a non-governmental organisation specialised in urban art that I was founding in the beginning of 2017. The purpose of the association is to make art that enlivens urban environments in Helsinki as well as in other cities in Finland and abroad. We introduce new ways of using urban space, create participatory urban culture and solve problems by means of art and activism.
Helsinki Urban Art was created on the basis of the More Street Art in Helsinki -project that created several street art pieces in 2016 which enlivened the urban environment. Helsinki Urban Art expands this activity and brings even more art and more versatile forms of art into the urban space.
Helsinki Urban Art is formed by a group of professionals in visual arts, community arts and urban activism. Involving the communities and respecting the special characteristics of the places is important to us: we want the art that we create to really work in its environment and to suit the needs of the locals. Our team has a lot of experience in producing large murals, different sized street art pieces as well as coordinating large participatory art projects and different urban events. We also collaborate with many people working in the field of urban art both in Finland and abroad.
29
I myself live in Helsinki in the area of Konepaja, which is an area where they used to build train engines and train cars. Currently the area is a combination of new apartment buildings and historical red brick warehouses. After the previous industry left the site, a lot of cultural activity has been sparked in the area and office spaces have been created into the old industrial buildings. Konepaja area has become an area that not only attracts people into new houses, but also draws in different kinds of actors, events and visitors from different parts of the city.
To get these different parties together, to create a more communal spirit to the area, and to use the full potential of the historical machine workshop buildings, Antti Möller, myself and a few other residents started Konepaja Movement in November 2016. The movement became very topical a few days later, when the construction supply shop Bauhaus announced its plan to build a massive shop and a parking space in the area.
These plans were completely different to those that the residents, the current renters and the city had in mind. We collected information about what the situation with the building and the detailed plan was, and shared it on social media. The special exception application submitted by Bauhaus to the city, which would allow them to make changes to the detailed plan and go through with the building project, received an enormous amount of negative feedback. The city received more than 500 notes on the plan, when normally they would get one or two, and in the end the City Planning Committee ended up opposing the plan.
Konepaja Movement has from the beginning wanted to develop the area into a more positive direction, not just oppose something. We started to bring the people interested in the area together and created our own preliminary plan for the future use of the buildings to create conversation and to show that there are alternative options.
Since it became clear that buying the buildings would not be possible without the help of a wealthy investor, I also contacted Bruce Oreck, the former United States ambassador and real estate investor. He got enthusiastic about the area to the extent that he wanted to buy the same buildings that Bauhaus sought. But this time it was made in a totally different way: we organised a meeting with the local people to discuss about the plans. More than 300 people came to the meeting, where all supported this new alternative. After many twists and turns the deal was also made, and now the Konepajan alue is finally being developed in the direction that the inhabitants wanted. Within a few years, it is expected to be one of the most interesting places in the city and the new centre of creative industries.
26
The culture center Stoa in Helsinki asked me to be a part of a culture course that they were arranging for eight graders in the spring of 2016. In the workshops, named “taking over your neighbourhood with every-day activism”, the eighth graders from schools from eastern Helsinki took part in six-hour workshops. In the workshops, the students turned into activists for the day, and created a project or a performance in their school or in their neighbourhoods. Some of the projects the students did were making a proposal on how to improve the school lunches, and creating a new design for the school hallway. Several classes gave out free coffee to strangers passing by to cheer people up. The students giving out coffee ended up meeting all kinds of people, from old people to people in the streets, and the other way around: the people coming to get free coffee got a chance to update their view on teenagers. Some of the students got so involved with the project that they stayed to hand out free coffee even after their school day was finished.
03
Do you think that the world is only changed between politicians and behind closed doors? Well you thought wrong. We all have power. We just have to use it, or it will use us.
Overtakers is a project started by Yhteismaa and Tatsi ry in 2015, which aims at giving the power back to the young people who have found themselves outside of the labour markets. Taking over is a way of doing, where the young people do things themselves, together with workers, unemployed people, managers and experts. The idea is to offer tools for the young people, with which they can make a difference in the issues they find meaningful and this way, to be recognised as people working for the common good. It prevents young people from losing their courage and helps them to see possibilities.
I was a part of planning the project and starting its action during the first year. Currently Tatsi ry is responsible for the project.
