Photo by Vikram Pradhan
This workshop invites participants into fictional and somatic explorations of the body’s physical magic. Focusing on three body parts—the mouth, the skin, and the brain—it draws from areas central to Teo Ala-Ruona’s recent work.
At the heart of Al-Ruona's practice is the decategorization of the body: a way of making space for the inexplicability of being human, for strangeness, and for comical obscurity. Through movement, touching practices, and imaginative scores, participants will enter a playful reconfiguration of body parts in a psychophysical process shaped by Ala-Ruona’s performance works Lacuna (2021), Parachorale (2024), and the upcoming Damnat (2027).
Please bring comfortable clothing and a few extra layers with you. We’ll be working with an undressing exercise, and if you don’t want to show bare skin, it’s good to have a few extra garments. This workshop will include group work.
Click here to explore the full programme.
At the heart of Al-Ruona's practice is the decategorization of the body: a way of making space for the inexplicability of being human, for strangeness, and for comical obscurity. Through movement, touching practices, and imaginative scores, participants will enter a playful reconfiguration of body parts in a psychophysical process shaped by Ala-Ruona’s performance works Lacuna (2021), Parachorale (2024), and the upcoming Damnat (2027).
Please bring comfortable clothing and a few extra layers with you. We’ll be working with an undressing exercise, and if you don’t want to show bare skin, it’s good to have a few extra garments. This workshop will include group work.
Click here to explore the full programme.
Bio
Teo Ala-Ruona is an interdisciplinary artist based in Helsinki, working within the expanded field of performance. In his work, he experiments with the possibilities of somatic fiction to influence our perceptions of the human body, exploring the interplay between linguistic, semiotic, and biological existence, while engaging with themes of techno-trans-masculinity and eco-normative narratives of “naturalness”.
By often using his own body as a site for the various speculative stories to take place, he is experimenting with how fiction can alter both the performer and the audience’s ways of perceiving. He approaches trans corporeality as an arena, where various normative processes of naturalization and standardisation become infeasible, and seeks to disrupt the heteronormative biases permeating research in biology and gender. Ala-Ruona is dedicated to the transgressive potential of performance art to open up our understanding of humanity, challenging our comprehension of bodily limits and perceptions of normalcy and conventionality. Ala-Ruona’s work derives enjoyment from the peculiar and the perplexing, while crafting carefully considered and choreographed audience engagement, deeply practiced performers’ practice, as well as emotional and psychological tension.
Ala-Ruona’s work has recently been shown in Performa Biennial (New York), The Vilnius Biennial of Performance Art (Vilnius), The Finnish National Gallery Kiasma (Helsinki), The Institute of Contemporary Arts in London (London), Sequences festival (Reykjavik), Centrale Fies (Dro) and Toaster/Husets Teater (Copenhagen). Ala-Ruona graduated from Master’s Programme in Art Education at Aalto University School of Arts, Design and Architecture in 2016 and from Master’s Programme in Ecology and Contemporary Performance, at Helsinki Theatre Academy in 2018.
In partnership with the Finnish Institute in the UK and Ireland
06:00 pm
Fri, 18 Jul 2025
Stage
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