About

Idea & format

TRE TRE TRE is conceptualised as a curatorial format that brings together a series of processes and experiments situated in three different forest regions in the North Eastern corner of the Nordic countries. The forests of Pasvik, Paljakka and Temminki-Markkatieva are located at a distance of approximately 800 km from each other. Together they form a triangle.

Here, fieldwork is being conducted by small groups of artists and various other knowledge carriers. As we return to the forest with artistic tools, methods and gestures, we contribute towards weaving vessels of sensual knowledges, resting in forest-human relationships, and founded on the basis of each contributor's particular practice and affinities. As the processes gradually ground the work within these places, they make physical and imaginary connections between the three forest localities. They gradually perform a triangulation.

‘Triangulation’ is a term found in different fields. It is a method used in sociology and in geometry. In art it has been used to stress a non-binary worldview¹. Three, as a number, is considered auspicious, and even sacred, in most mystical traditions. In physics, the number is too large to describe, while mathematics says it proves its existence. In some indigenous languages, only the numbers one and two exist, while the number after two indicates 'more'. Many words with the prefix tri- also have the meaning of more than two (e.g. the word Tribe).

In cartography, triangulation is an outdated method from when land surveyors physically measured and staked out elevations and distances using optical devices and physical measuring sticks (now replaced by GPS and trilateration). It resembles the acts of TRE TRE TRE, where bodies and instruments are physically placed and in motion in the forest. One can only partially contribute to the simple principle of triangulation: That observation from more than two points provides a richer opportunity to understand phenomena.

1. Malin Arnell and Åsa Elzén has worked wih the triangle and triangulation in several works in opposition to binarity, most recently in Skogen kallar, a public art work that connects stories of the the Fogelstad group work, a feminist initiative formed in Sweden in 1921, with the act of the artists’ preservation of a triangular-shaped forest in Southern Sweden for the next 50 years

Background & partners

Pasvik, Paljakka & Temminiki-Markkatieva are forests and communities in the so-called “periphery” of the Nordics. These regions are experiencing change due to recent geopolitical shifts, climate change, depopulation, new initiatives in energy production, and the continued threat of centralisation of social services. With events and research on ecologies of soil substrate, forest and rural communities, we aim to challenge understandings, shift the cultural values of "rurality" and "periphery", and disrupt the value systems that see these places, localities and positions as mere extractable "resource areas".

TRE TRE TRE is based on the idea of a long-term collaboration between three of the partners that work close to these forest localities: Mustarinda in the border area between Hyrynsalmi and Poulanka east in Kainuu, Lena Ylipää in the village of Lainio east in Kiruna kommun, and Hilde Methi in Kirkenes, Sør-Varanger, in Eastern Finnmark, together with a loosely knit network of local and visiting art-knowledge constallations working in parallel or crossing paths.

Participants so far, in addition to the above mentioned, are: Neal Cahoon, Mar Fjell, Marlin Anhell, Rusto Myllylahti, Kristin Taarnesvik, Remi Vesala, Jade Kallio, the research project “Anthropogenic Soils: Recuperating Human-Soil Relationships on a Troubled Planet” (2022-28): Nora S. Vaage, Ursula Münster, Susanne Bauer, Marianne Lien, and Annike Flo with Cornelya Klutsch at NIBIO Svanhovd, Sallamari Rantila and Miina Kaartinen (Mustarinda), Kajsa Møllersen and Espen Sommer Eide.