Wellesley College Davis Museum to showcase Finnish artist

The Davis Museum at Wellesley College next month launches Eija-Liisa Ahtila: Olentoja (Creatures), a multi-installation presentation by Finnish artist Eija-Liisa Ahtila.

The showcase, which is free and open to the public, opens Sept. 18 and is on view through Jan. 5, 2014. An opening reception with the artist will be held on Sept. 18 from 5:30-8 p.m.

“Eija-Liisa Ahtila is best known for her lushly beautiful and psychologically intense videos, and for the precise calibration (of image, sound, and environment) of her installations,” said Lisa Fischman, the museum’s director and curator of this exhibition.

The five works featured are Horizontal (2011), Anthropomorphic Exercises on Film (2011), Companions (2011), The Annunciation (2010), and The House (2002).

International cultural theorist, critic and artist Mieke Bal will be participating in several events held in conjunction with Eija-Liisa Ahtila: Olentoja (Creatures). On Sept. 21, Bal will join Ahtila in a discussion on ‘The Politics of Art,’ which celebrates the global launch of Bal’s newest publication, Thinking in Film: The Politics of Video Installation According to Eija-Liisa Ahtila.  On Sept. 23, Bal screens her latest film, Madame B., based on Flaubert’s Madame Bovary, and on Sept. 25, she will give a mid-day gallery talk on the exhibition.