Sara Ilveskorpi

Sara Ilveskorpi is a visual artist, art educator and gardener (plant production and organic farming). Her practice takes place on Nytorp Farm on the Island of Kimitoön in Southwest Finland. Ilveskorpi considers her work as site-specific, where the unique ecology of the site is explored and affected symbiotically. The main themes in her practice are permanence, temporality, and flexibility.

Her research focuses on the ontological and philosophical questions of self-sufficiency, and self-sufficiency as a living practice. She argues that we are aware of the limitations of natural resources and the current destructive use of them, but it is problematic for an individual to understand and accept their place in the face of ecological reconstruction from an ecological and cultural position. This is because it challenges their being entangled in contemporary living. Her proposition to cover for the lack of comprehension is the concept of self-sufficiency as a lived experience. In her research self-sufficiency is inquired with artistic practice, art education and environment aesthetics. The research is urgent at a time of disasters and pandemics, when the role of art and culture in mental resilience to crises has been noticed at the state level.