Hanna-Kaisa Korolainen
Master of Arts, Doctoral Candidate
Hanna-Kaisa Korolainen is Finnish multidisciplinary artist, designer, and researcher. She has Master of Arts degree in Textile Design from Aalto University School of Art, Design and Architecture, Licence (equivalent of B.A.) in Fine Arts from University of Paris 8 and B.A. in Photography from TUAS Arts Academy. Her artistic practice involves ceramics, glass and textile art.Korolainen has been showing her artworks in exhibitions in Finland and abroad, from Beijing to Milan and New York. Her latest exhibitions include, for example, EMMA – Espoo Museum of Modern Art, Design Museum Helsinki, Craft Museum of Finland, Ostrobothnian Museum, historical art nouveau site Hvitträsk or Schloss Hollenegg for Design in Austria.
Doctoral research
Korolainen’s research investigates the role of inspiration in the creative process. She approaches the topic through her artistic practice.
Every practitioner yearns for inspiration. It fuels the creative process with desire and motivation. However, it seems unclear what inspiration exactly is and where it comes from. Practitioners might experience an obscure state of being inspired without knowing how and why it happened. Possibly they can remember something they saw or experienced beforehand that made them feel inspired. These inspiring ‘things’ or ‘happenings’ can be called sources of inspiration. These sources of inspiration, from the practitioners’ point of view, have not been extensively researched within the fields of art and design. Designers and artists themselves do not often reveal their sources of inspiration, as if they ought to be protected or sourcing external inspiration was embarrassing. The surrounding world is so filled with visual and other kinds of stimuli that it would be nearly impossible not to be influenced or inspired by some of them. Even if a practitioner were to attempt to create something in an empty vacuum with nothing but her own mind, would that mind not be already filled with all kinds of impressions of the life lived, and a myriad of various things seen, experienced, and learned? Memories of childhood entangled with stories read and heard, sunsets and sunrises seen in famous landscape paintings confused with real-life experiences.
Throughout this study, Korolainen tries to trace how consciously selected sources of inspiration influence the creative process and its outcome. There are three approaches: 1) the relationship between the practitioner and the source of inspiration, 2) the differences between inspiration and copying, and 3) the idea of shared authorship. Korolainen conducts her study as a practitioner who is simultaneously the artist and the researcher, opening up her own creative process to the investigation. In this way, new information can be sourced from the inside of the process, hoping to discover aspects that will interest other practitioners and the field of creative studies in general. Korolainen hopes to demonstrate the possible threads woven between makers, eras and cultures and shed light upon the concept of inspiration.
As the artistic components of this study, Korolainen executed three exhibitions and numerous artefacts (in ceramics, glass, and textile) in which the influence of the sources of inspiration was materialized. These artefacts are important informants in this study and not all information can or should be verbalized. In addition, as part of the theoretical foundation, Korolainen tries to outline the concept of inspiration, sources of inspiration and becoming/ being inspired. She does this by exploring neighbouring themes such as imitation, intertextuality and appropriation. Korolainen also draws from the history of inspiration and investigates how the general understanding of the topic has developed through time.
The centre of Korolainen’s study lies in a collaboration-like relationship between the practitioner and sources of inspiration. Even though the word collaboration might seem wrongly placed here, since sources of inspiration often greatly affect the creative process, she believes their role should be given the attention it deserves. Sources participate in initiating the process and accompanying the practitioner along the way, almost like physically absent family members or longtime friends. As a practitioner, Korolainen forms an inner dialogue with them. Even without spoken words, sources can speak to a practitioner who has learned to listen to them. Often these relationships can endure several years, or even a lifetime.