Mika Elo

Keynote Speaker

Biography

Mika Elo works as professor of artistic research at the University of the Arts Helsinki, Finland. The areas of his research interest include theory of photography, media aesthetics, and epistemology of artistic research. He is participating in the discussions in these areas in the capacity of visual artist, educator, curator and researcher.

Mika Elo: A collage of two elements (mirage and press release), 2025

horizon of expectat_

Symposium participation

In this talk I will revisit a text that I published in RUUKKU – Studies in Artistic Research journal's voices section under the title "Three Phases of Artistic Research" a couple of years ago. I will relate the schematic overview of the key debates around artistic research presented in that text to some questions activated by the currently ongoing reform of doctoral education in the Finnish universities initiated by UNIFI (The Council of Rectors of Finnish Universities). The questions of what artistic research is and what it can do in the interdisciplinary field of research need to be re-thought within a newly formulated horizon of expectations. Rather than offering answers or guidelines, I focus on formulating questions that hopefully trigger discussion and further thinking.