ABOUT
The Sidewalk Project was envisioned as a dynamic initiative to engage Vantaa residents and the wider Capital Region in exploring performance art, emphasizing this medium as a powerful, accessible form of self-expression. Sidewalk was initiated by The Other Side Performance Art Platform.
The project aimed to remove barriers between art and the public, encouraging participants to reflect on their experiences and creatively express them through the medium of performance art.
With a focus on inclusivity, the project welcomed, through an open call, all individuals from diverse cultural and educational backgrounds, prioritizing enthusiasm over experience. This approach ensured that performance art became a medium through which all participants could meaningfully engage with art, regardless of their previous artistic experience.
Sidewalk's 3rd edition was executed in collaboration with the Finnish Museum of Photography.
Phase 1: Workshops and Lectures
The first phase of The Sidewalk 3rd Ed. 2025 began with workshops led by Leena Kela, introducing participants to performance art and encouraging experimentation. Alongside these sessions, participants benefited from insights shared by distinguished guest lecturers, including Henrik Vestergaard, Essi Kausalainen, and Annette Arlander. These artists offered diverse perspectives that enriched participants’ understanding of performance art as a versatile, accessible medium and assigned participants a task to ponder and reflect on.
Phase 2: Ideation and Execution of Performances
Participants also received personalized guidance from Leena Kela, the project mentor, Parsa Kamehkhosh, and Aman Askarizad, helping them refine their ideas, arrange logistics, and develop their final performance pieces. At this stage, participants also had to think about the presence of cameras and documentation in their works in order to decide on details of their acts and what they want to emphasize on. This phase concludes with The Other Side team carefully documenting each participant’s performance through both video and photography.
Phase 3: Post-production and Exhibition
In the third phase of The Sidewalk 3rd Ed. 2026, attention shifted to post-production and preparing for the final exhibition. The performances, captured during the execution phase, were edited by The Other Side team or by participants who chose to handle the editing themselves. The performances filmed in the art project will be exhibited at the Finnish Museum of Photography.
PARTICIPANTS
Thomas Slätis
Bambi Kalland
Maricon Cubio
Mohsen Mortezaei
Niina Rita
Iisa-Sofia Karsten
Thuy Ha Luong
Sinan Kaplan
Heiki Mahlamäki
Anita Grönroos
Juno Tikhomirov
Arya Vattappilly Shiraj
WORKSHOPS
Photo credit: Aman Askarizad
INTERVIEWS
Check out the interviews with the mentor of Sidewalk 3Rd Edition 2026 and some of the lecturers of the program.
Leena Kela is a performance artist, curator, and Doctor of Fine Arts from the Academy of Fine Arts, Uniarts Helsinki. Her artistic practice explores structural changes in society, environmental crises, and relationships between human and non-human bodies through site-specific and duration-based performances.
She is the artistic director of New Performance Turku Biennale and has presented her work extensively in festivals, museums, and art institutions across Europe, the Americas, Africa, Asia, and Oceania.
As an educator, her work focuses on horizontal learning, the dialogue between corporeality and materiality, and performance as a tool for political agency and critical reflection.
Henrik Vestergaard, together with Ellen Friis, founded Live Art Danmark in 2004, where he has served as Director ever since. He holds a BA in Theatre Science from the University of Copenhagen (1998) and an MA in Theaterwissenschaft from the Freie Universität Berlin (2003).
Throughout his career, Vestergaard has worked with Verk Produksjoner, Liminal, and Hotel Pro Forma, and served as Artistic Leader of Zarathustras Onkel from 2003 to 2012. His work as a director includes 50 Dangerous Things (You Should Let Your Children Do), Playing Up – Nordic Edition, Virak Revy, Kaboom – The Art of Destruction, and Daily Life: The World's Most Boring Show.
Annette Arlander (b. 1956, Helsinki) is an artist, researcher, and pedagogue, recognized as one of the pioneers of Finnish performance art (active since the 1980s) and a trailblazer in artistic research (since the 1990s).
Essi Kausalainen's works operate through performance, textile, text, audio, and video. Collaborating with intergenerational ensembles, materials, and spaces, she observes the complex web of interdependencies that shape our bodies and being. Kausalainen's work has been exhibited and performed in venues such as Bonniers konsthall (Stockholm), Kiasma (Helsinki), MCA (Chicago), Tenthaus (Oslo), Inkonst (Malmö), Somerset House Studios in London, and Moderna Museet Malmö. Since 2017, she has collaborated closely with the Chicago-based company Every house has a door.
EXHIBITION
The Sidewalk 3rd Edition Exhibition is going to take place at the Finnish Museum of Photography. The opening is on February 4, 2027.
