Framed by Tradition

In Juminkeko’s autumn exhibition, Finnish artist Reeta Suvanto reflects on how the gaze shapes our perception of culture. How does the museumization of culture – and becoming museumized – relate to the preservation of culture as something living?
As an artist, she is dependent on the gaze. Suvanto asks: what happens when alienation and detachment unintentionally seep into that gaze? How can we benefit from preserving culture in museums without losing it in the process?
She seeks physical responses to these questions – artworks grounded in museum discoveries and stories passed down in her family. Suvanto studies the clothing of the Viena Karelian woman, its symbolism, and her own gaze as an artist. Her works explore the tensions between authorship, the objective gaze, and imagination, ultimately rooting themselves deeply in Karelian culture and language.