Outi writes about her work

I often find and work with new materials to bring weaving beyond traditional craft. I recently bought a Karelian table linen from a flee market in the Finnish countryside, handwoven, with Karelian red picking patterns along the cloth, size 200x90cm for 4€ - I thought: "holy shi... Is this really what handwoven pieces are worth to most poeple?"

On the other hand, with digital jacquard weaving, I find it challenging to add a narrative element that mixes well with the emblem weaving carries: home and familiarity, soft and pleasant.

By creating the woven material myself I get a unique expression. I mainly use mono-filament leftovers from a technical weaving manufacturer. I drive my car full of mono-filament yarns down from North-East Finland to a small entrepreneur near Helsinki where fibers are then braided to ropes according to my design. I have constructed a simple weave structure to give a maximum room for these ropes to create different shades of color.

I often portray landscapes. They give room for unexpected things to happen on the surface without the motive being ruined. I have admired renaissance tapestries and the golden and silver yarns woven into them, and how this has enlightened the room through reflecting the light from candle chandeliers.

In my experiments to weave light reflective yarn is braided into a rope with other fibers. As the viewer passes by the woven surface the reflective rope lights up and reflects back. Recently I have started to project video onto the pieces with reflective yarn. This creates a rhythmic movement in front of the woven piece, a feeling of time passing by.