Research profile
Northern Art, Community and Environment Research (NACER) is a research group in the Faculty of Art and Design in the University of Lapland. NACER conducts research in the academic discipline of art education, including research on visual art education in schools, educational institutions and universities as well as in the broad field of visual art, including traditional Indigenous and other-than-Indigenous arts and contemporary collaborative art forms. NACER emphasises cultural and social cooperation and sustainable tourism, reflecting the profile of the University of Lapland.
NACER fosters global responsibility and sustainability through research-based activities in the Northern and Arctic context. Its participatory research reflects the changing sociocultural circumstances of an age of ecological crises and urbanisation and investigates future directions for sensitive, socially effective initiatives that use visual arts, art pedagogy and arts-based methods to benefit local communities and address global concerns.
NACER members employ expertise in arts-based research methods as a social activity for sustainability, using artistic research and arts-based methods to study art education and applied visual arts. Members draw upon participatory (co-research) and culturally sensitive methods to research and develop sustainability and socially and environmentally engaged artistic approaches in a Northern context, aiming to lead in the areas of applied visual arts and art education research and competence in the circumpolar Arctic.
NACER is led by Timo Jokela, Mirja Hiltunen (professors of art education) , Glen Coutts (professor of applied visual arts) and Maria Huhmarniemi (associate professor). Its members include postdoctoral researchers and doctoral candidates conducting research in art teaching and artistic activities in formal or informal education.
NACER has a strong collaboration with the UArctic’s Arctic Sustainable Art and Design (ASAD) network to promote art and research and educational development and to enhance arts and arts education studies for sustainability. Jokela has led ASAD since 2012 and was nominated as UArctic’s Chair of Art, Culture and Design in 2022. Through ASAD, NACER collaborates with many Arctic educational institutions on research interventions, exhibitions, seminars and publications, focusing on pedagogical solutions that address contemporary global and local challenges and annually arranging research seminars and exhibitions on the themes of Arctic sustainable arts and design education. NACER members are also active in the International Society for Education Through Art (InSEA), an official partner of UNESCO that encourages and advances creative education through art, design and crafts.
NACER fosters global responsibility and sustainability through research-based activities in the Northern and Arctic context. Its participatory research reflects the changing sociocultural circumstances of an age of ecological crises and urbanisation and investigates future directions for sensitive, socially effective initiatives that use visual arts, art pedagogy and arts-based methods to benefit local communities and address global concerns.
NACER members employ expertise in arts-based research methods as a social activity for sustainability, using artistic research and arts-based methods to study art education and applied visual arts. Members draw upon participatory (co-research) and culturally sensitive methods to research and develop sustainability and socially and environmentally engaged artistic approaches in a Northern context, aiming to lead in the areas of applied visual arts and art education research and competence in the circumpolar Arctic.
NACER is led by Timo Jokela, Mirja Hiltunen (professors of art education) , Glen Coutts (professor of applied visual arts) and Maria Huhmarniemi (associate professor). Its members include postdoctoral researchers and doctoral candidates conducting research in art teaching and artistic activities in formal or informal education.
NACER has a strong collaboration with the UArctic’s Arctic Sustainable Art and Design (ASAD) network to promote art and research and educational development and to enhance arts and arts education studies for sustainability. Jokela has led ASAD since 2012 and was nominated as UArctic’s Chair of Art, Culture and Design in 2022. Through ASAD, NACER collaborates with many Arctic educational institutions on research interventions, exhibitions, seminars and publications, focusing on pedagogical solutions that address contemporary global and local challenges and annually arranging research seminars and exhibitions on the themes of Arctic sustainable arts and design education. NACER members are also active in the International Society for Education Through Art (InSEA), an official partner of UNESCO that encourages and advances creative education through art, design and crafts.