Sofia Okkonen (FI, b. 1987) is a Helsinki-based visual artist, working with staged photography, fashion photography and other creative practices and commissions. At the core of her work is the depiction of simultaneous but oppositional or contradicting emotions and moods. Okonnen studies how ideas about our ideal selves, beauty, trauma, the erotic, and fantasies present themselves in front of the camera: on one hand through directed posing and on the other hand through the uncontrolled and the subconscious.
Honey, Please is a photographic installation covering the floors and walls with digitally printed textiles, creating an immersive experience for viewers as they arrive in the gallery space. Started in 2020, Honey, Please is a curious and hopeful attempt to recover from chronic anxiety characterised by an impending sense of doom. The work intertwines the decline of pollinators due to loss of biodiversity with questions of low birth rate, the pressure to procreate, a budding baby fever – and a potentially catastrophic future.
Artist is presented by SOFT images
