Author Archives: Johanna

About Johanna

artist and curator

good gig in Oulu

I’m sitting on a train from Oulu to Kuopio. Last night I performed Acts of Clothing in Oulu to a full house and left feeling quite happy and satisfied. Here’s a link to the interview in Kaleva. I love performing that show although it somehow takes a lot out of me. A lot of energy, lot of strength, a lot of layers, emotions, feelings. The performance was perhaps a bit more emotional than usually as yesterday would have been my sister’s 32nd birthday. And there were some relatives in the audience, too, which is always a bit scary. But they loved the show and afterwards we had a dinner in an Indian restaurant – the same one where I last saw my sister exactly a year ago.
It was great to see Pirjo, my old time friend, teacher and collegue. I shared my pains and pleasures of performing, of donating my body to a certain imagery and the emotions and questions it has raised. The questions of being scrutinized by anybody, being viewed by the critical eye, the perhaps ‘evil’ eye. Why do I do it? Why do I set myself in the scenes that cause me so much emotional pain? Of course I know why – as the choreographer and director – but it’s yet again a different thing to experience all that as a performer, as a living and breathing and feeling human body. Not easy.
I’m longing for my exercise routines that have been a bit lost during the last weeks when I was in Sydney and now in Oulu. I’m dreaming of Pipsa’s Kinesis sport and functional training sessions and I wouldn’t mind a Zumba class on Saturday morning either! How weird is that?

Johanna

Acst of Clothing in Oulu on Sunday the 30th of Jan

I’m performing Acts of Clothing on Sunday in Oulu. JoJo – Oulu Dance Centre hosts the show which I’ll perform in Oulun Taidekoulu.
Here’s an interview about the show in Oulu-lehti. Also Kaleva interviewed me and I think the interview comes out either tomorrow or on Sunday. I haven’t performed in Oulu for ages, maybe the last time in 2000. Hopefully people will find their way to the show as my childhood town Oulu and the neighbouring island Hailuoto play a big part in it.

So if you are in Oulu or somewhere near, see you on Sunday at 4pm!

Johanna

post holiday blues and travel preparations

There wasn’t much anything special about the holidays besides the luxury of time. The time to do things that in the normal everyday do not get enough attention, do not have enough peace around to be able to happen.
So I read books. I knitted. I made a lamp (pic to be appeared later).

I knitted a floor pillow. And not only the cover, I also sewed the pillow inside the knitted one. The carpet is Tempo 207 by Hanna Korvela Design.



Besides Australia & Sydney travel guides, I read quite a few books during the holidays. The best one was Raja by Riikka Pulkkinen and now I’m reading Luokkaretkellä hyvinvointiyhteiskunnassa which is quite thought provoking and inspiring.

I’ve made some preparations for the trip and finally bought a new suitcase! Love this Samsonite Aeris spin case:


And Sari from Visio cut & dyed my hair on Saturday. I think I’m slowly getting ready for the long journey to Australia…


Johanna

my performance today

I performed today at the Dancing Advent Calendar in the Maxim shop window in the city centre of Kuopio. I’m performing eight times and today was my fourth live action for the calender. Unfortunately, there’s no documentation of the performances but this is what was left after my show.



If you are interested, there’s a performance everyday at 4.30pm until the 24th of Dec by me, Johanna Keinänen or Anniina Aunola. On the 24th the performance will be at 11am. The Dancing Advent Calender is organized by the Dance Centre of Eastern Finland.

Johanna

problems with my shuffle

I’ve been soooo annoyed by Apple for the last couple of days! Last year I bought an iPod shuffle from New York and now, a couple of weeks ago, the remote control of the headphones stopped working. First, I checked the exact date I bought the shuffle and realized that the one year limited warranty had expired, of course. As I was resetting the iPod and trying to find out from Apple’s website if this was a common problem that could somehow be solved, I found information that 3rd generation iPod shuffles with a certain serial number (made between 2009 and 2010) had a fault in the headphones and that Apple would replace them within 2 years of purchase. Hurray, I thought. My serial number fitted. I followed Apple’s guidelines on their website how to send a product placement request. The last page on their website said that my request had been submitted and that I will receive an email within an hour with the repair status information. But I will also have to FAX a proof of purchase to Apple. What the hell???? Anyway, I got really annoyed when I did not receive the email and I still haven’t. But even more annoying was the thought of having to fax my proof of purchase to Apple although I have an Apple ID and they very well and easily can see what and when and where I have purchased (I bought the shuffle in the Mac Store through my Apple account). So today I’ve set up a fax account to be able to fax the bloody receipt to Apple and there’s still no email from them. Should I make another product replacement request or what???? I also think Apple could have been in touch with the people having the shuffles with the headphone problem, at least the ones with the Apple ID… I wonder how many people have bought the headphones with the remote control without knowing that it’s not their fault that they are not working. 
Anyway, let’s see what happens!

Do you have a 3rd generation iPod shuffle with serial number:
xx909xxxxxx – xx952xxxxxx
xx001xxxxxx – xx004xxxxxx

Here’s what to do in Finnish: http://www.apple.com/fi/support/headphones/replacementprogram/
and in: English: http://www.apple.com/support/headphones/replacementprogram/

Johanna

weekend

Unfortunately I wasn’t able to fully enjoy the long weekend with the Independence day as I performed Acts of Clothing on Saturday night. But the performance went well and was fun to do. The audience consisted mostly of people who don’t spend so much time with art and many of them were positively surprised, enjoyed themselves and asked me where they could see something like this more often. So that was nice. But yes, I’ve had two days off which has been more than needed. My flu is now finally better and I’ve managed to catch up some sleep. I just don’t understand why I couldn’t fall asleep tonight… Well, I do understand actually. I’ve so many things to do and finish, emails to answer, meetings to attend and arrange that they all just twirl in my head. And I’m also doing a little performance tomorrow so that worries me a bit.
Anyway, we had a lovely dinner tonight with sweet potato pie, crayfish paste and rye bread and grilled salmon. Delicious! I also had time to hoover and go for a run. Not bad.


Last week I had a few meetings in different café’s in Kuopio. I seriously don’t understand why Burts Coffee, Kaneli or Fado cannot make their latte’s or cappuccinos with skimmed milk??? Latte for example has a lot of milk in it and tastes completely different if they use the so called ‘coffee milk’ (which tastes awful) or the full fat milk. I don’t understand why the owners of the café’s don’t get this point. So I couldn’t have a coffee in Kaneli or Burts last week. They have seriously lost me as their customer which is a shame as it would be nice to support the small business as supposed to the chains.

Johanna