Alexandra Marina:
BODY HISTORY MUSEUM

Alexandra Marina: BODY HISTORY MUSEUM (Hall 1)

Alexandra Marina’s BODY HISTORY MUSEUM is exhibited in a new iteration, as part of a multiyear, conceptual project that researches, experiments with and expresses the idea of body history. It is a phenomenological approach to the multiple, ever-changing, dynamic body images we have and the relation they have to the lived body, the body-for-others and the body as seen by others.

The works move between digital and analog worlds, the ethereal and the physical, playing with the illuminated, the trapped, and the moving body. The imagined laboratory with scientific deepdives into the lived experience is combined with ritual practices lending symbolism from different belief systems and the sciences. Just like the body, it is boundless in its expression.

At HAA Gallery Alexandra Marina is also premiering three video works using movement rituals, dance, and chaos magic to deal with personal experiences from a marginalized perspective. The works use narratives of body centered grief, the fetishization and rejection of the sexualized, fat body, and trauma related to healthcare.

BODY HISTORY MUSEUM is not just a museum. It is a laboratory. It is a temple.

Alexandra Marina (b. 1986) is a multidisciplinary artist living and working in Pietarsaari. Her art is often centered around the body, and is intersectional and feminist at its core. She creates through the experience of living in a marginalized, chronically ill, partially disabled, fat and queer body and works with various media. In her current work, she mostly uses photography, film, dance, installation and text.

She holds a bachelor’s degree in both Film and TV production (Novia, 2009) and Fine Arts (Novia, 2023). She has exhibited in many solo and group exhibitions in recent years and is currently exhibiting BODY HISTORY MUSEUM around Finland.

Thanks to Taike, Svenska Kulturfonden, Svenska Österbottens kulturfond, Konstsamfundet, and Eugéne, Elisabet och Birgit Nygrens stiftelse.