Nina Luostarinen
Nina Luostarinen is a DA from the University of Lapland, Faculty of Arts and Design. She currently works at Humak University of Applied Sciences as an RDI specialist and senior lecturer. She has a background in puppetry, media art and cultural management. Both her research and artistic interests intertwine with topics of imaginary worlds, playfulness, serendipity, connection to places and facilitating emotions that can ease attachment and empathy.
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DissertationLuostarinen, N. (2023). Paikkaleikkejä ja leikin paikkoja – leikillisillä taideinterventioilla kohti paikkaempatiaa. Acta electronica Universitatis Lapponiensis 363. Lapin yliopisto. https://urn.fi/URN:ISBN:978-952-337-392-1
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The recognition of art and culture's role in shaping our environmental relationship is growing, evident in official publications and discussions. Art's transformative power is emphasized, notably by Sitra's 2023 report on deteriorating ecosystems. A cultural shift towards embracing playfulness is also noted, sparking societal importance, termed the "ludic turn."
Nina Luostarinen's research aims to integrate play into place experiences, targeting adult accessibility. She designs art-based intervention tools to deepen understanding and facilitate effective implementation. Three factors guide her perspective: adult play, place, and art, informed by human geography and post-humanist thinking. Using art-based action research, she implemented playful interventions from 2014 to 2021. The research emphasizes planning and implementation, analyzing reflective and secondary data to understand experiential aspects influenced by play. Each intervention underwent iterative cycles driving the dissertation's progression. Five main intervention cycles emerged: Mätäsmetäs, light painting, art-war-play, emotional mapping, and land art. Results underscore the core elements—place, source, tool, and alibi of play—essential for intervention success. Alibis create a protective space for adult play, vital for immersive experiences. The interventions engaged adults through sensory stimulation, fostering imaginative, multisensory, and empathic experiences. Play often thrived in natural or emotionally evocative settings, transcending adult constraints. Ruined sites and forests transformed into playgrounds, highlighting the transformative potential of playful art interventions. Encouraging adult play fosters attachment to places reminiscent of childhood, aligning with the ludic turn. Art-based activities offer respite from adult responsibilities, promoting wonder and innovation within a playful sphere. Embracing playfulness enhances environmental connections, paving the way for creative interactions and insights. |
Highlights from research publications
Rehearsing for the future: play, place and art This paper explores the confluence of art, play and places, presenting three case studies enacted via participatory art projects which asked: How can artistic play change our relationship to place? The research was practice-based via participatory art and presents new, ludic cultural practices in regards to art, play and place. The case studies discuss how participants became liberated from normal adult behaviour in public spaces because of the alibi of art and play, as well as enjoying and interacting with the place differently. The artworks were contextually responsive to the specificities of each place, allowing players an opportunity to develop new, positive place-relationships. It also includes a reflection on the political imperatives of play in assisting adults imagining new futures for themselves. The findings of this paper are useful to those involved in heritage or cultural projects seeking to develop new audience relationships with their specific places. To the publication
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Sculpting Places with Play: Revealing the Alternative Dimension (of Place) with Participatory PhotoplayThis visual essay works at the confluence of art, place and play and presents a practice which asks: what can happen if we take a group of adults and classical paintings as inspiration and have them play together in specific places? It aims to demonstrate the visual souvenirs of adult play, the photographs taken by the participants. The objective is to interpret them in order to gain an understanding of how hierarchy-free encounters in the liminal space of play can foster empathy for places. Pausing to gaze at the visual data, it seems that with art-based play, we create lasting memories after which the place, the players and the source art can never be seen with indifference again. This can lead to emotions, actions and activism towards a more desirable future. To the publication
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Research Output
Selected publications
Luostarinen, N. (2023). Paikkaleikkejä ja leikin paikkoja – leikillisillä taideinterventioilla kohti paikkaempatiaa. Acta electronica Universitatis Lapponiensis 363. Lapin yliopisto. https://urn.fi/URN:ISBN:978-952-337-392-1
Iso-Aho, J., Luostarinen, N., & Vartiainen, P. (2022). Imagine this! Storytelling, places and empathy. In M. Sarantou, & S. Miettinen (Eds), Empathy and Business Transformation Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003227557
Luostarinen, N. (2020). On the blue path of place empathy. Research in Art and Education, September 2020, 54–77. https://doi.org/10.54916/rae.119289
Luostarinen, N. (2021). Sculpting places with play Revealing the alternative dimension (of place) with participatory photoplay. Research in Arts and Education, (3), 135-150. https://researtsedu.com/2021-september-3
Luostarinen, N. (2021). I will dye my hair for this - Failure in participatory art or emergent turn in play? IN-Visibilidades, (15), 106-113. https://doi.org/10.24981/16470508.15.11
Luostarinen, N. (2021). Collective Metamorphoses: Shifting Shapes for Connection. In R. Vella, & M. Sarantou (Eds), Documents of Socially Engaged Art (pp. 180-192). International Society for Education Through Art (InSEA). https://doi.org/10.24981/2021-DSEA
Luostarinen, N., & Hautio, M. (2019). Play (e)scapes: Stimulation of adult play through art-based action. The International Journal of New Media, Technology and the Arts, 14(3), 25–52. https://doi.org/10.18848/2326-9987/CGP/v14i03/25-52
Luostarinen, N., & MacKenzie, K. (2021). Paint That Place With Light! Light Painting as a Means of Creating Attachment to Historical Locations—An Arts-Based Action Research Project. In T. Seppälä, M. Sarantou, & S. Miettinen (Eds), Arts-Based Methods for Decolonising Participatory Research Routledge. Routledge Advances in Art and Visual Studies https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003053408
Iso-Aho, J., Luostarinen, N., & Vartiainen, P. (2022). Imagine this! Storytelling, places and empathy. In M. Sarantou, & S. Miettinen (Eds), Empathy and Business Transformation Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003227557
Luostarinen, N. (2020). On the blue path of place empathy. Research in Art and Education, September 2020, 54–77. https://doi.org/10.54916/rae.119289
Luostarinen, N. (2021). Sculpting places with play Revealing the alternative dimension (of place) with participatory photoplay. Research in Arts and Education, (3), 135-150. https://researtsedu.com/2021-september-3
Luostarinen, N. (2021). I will dye my hair for this - Failure in participatory art or emergent turn in play? IN-Visibilidades, (15), 106-113. https://doi.org/10.24981/16470508.15.11
Luostarinen, N. (2021). Collective Metamorphoses: Shifting Shapes for Connection. In R. Vella, & M. Sarantou (Eds), Documents of Socially Engaged Art (pp. 180-192). International Society for Education Through Art (InSEA). https://doi.org/10.24981/2021-DSEA
Luostarinen, N., & Hautio, M. (2019). Play (e)scapes: Stimulation of adult play through art-based action. The International Journal of New Media, Technology and the Arts, 14(3), 25–52. https://doi.org/10.18848/2326-9987/CGP/v14i03/25-52
Luostarinen, N., & MacKenzie, K. (2021). Paint That Place With Light! Light Painting as a Means of Creating Attachment to Historical Locations—An Arts-Based Action Research Project. In T. Seppälä, M. Sarantou, & S. Miettinen (Eds), Arts-Based Methods for Decolonising Participatory Research Routledge. Routledge Advances in Art and Visual Studies https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003053408