Artist Egle Oddo answered to the project’s questions with her photographs she took in her home in Helsinki.

Egle Oddo is an artist interested in operational realism meant as the presentation of the functional sphere in an aesthetic arrangement and its inter-relations. In her pieces, industrial production morphs towards delicate handcraft, life forms appear and emerge out of sculptures and objects, film photography appropriates digital images, selected trash mix with fashion, precious edible minerals and ancestral recipes are served as part of ritual meals.
Her work has been presented at international biennials, museums, and relevant institutions, as well as independent alternative spaces and events. Her recent shows include: Baltic Biennale (2010), 54th Venice Biennale (2011), Mänttä Art Festival (2015), Casablanca Biennale (2016), Triennal Agrikultura (2017), the 5x5x5 artists selection of Manifesta12 (2018), CrossSections_intensities at Kunsthalle Exnergasse WUK in Vienna (2018), and Growing a Language at Museo delle Trame Mediterranee of Fondazione Orestiadi (2018). Currently she is the Chair of Pixelache Helsinki and member of board of Myymälä2 art gallery. She was also directing Pixelache Festival, Planet Suvilahti festival, and coordinated the participation of Collective Intelligence in Manifesta 12.

What was the last project you were working on that got disturbed by the Coronavirus?

I was preparing to visit Sicily and Tunisia to work with my cultural partners there. I am working on specific aspects of vegetal biodiversity in the Mediterranean Basin. Here you see seeds of Tecrium fruticans or vulgarly called Camedrio femmina, which I collected myself in 2018 in the Natural Reserve of Santa Ninfa, in Sicily. Tecrium is useful to transition from disturbed, dry and scarcely populated plots, into a fully formed Mediterranean lush.

How are you managing your work now?

I am growing Mediterranean lush at home. Including trees, wild grains, and so called mission impossible plants such as argan.

What do you hope the situation to be „when it is over”? Concerning world in general or just the art world

I see a lot of associations between the present situation and female body, there are strange associations rising from political debate. In this picture you see how I am growing moss on rotten and polluted surfaces, as a form of artistic response to collapse. Moss is difficult to grow at home, it presents extremophilic behavior sometimes. I don’t know if I am more inclined towards domesticating wild plants, or if I am anticipating my home being part of a future wild environment.

Is there any read, movie or an artwork that you’d like to share that seem important for you now

Sally Mann, What Remains. 2003.

Here I took a picture of one of her collodium pictures. This spectacular photographic series talks about facing decomposition, death, transition, and finding a landscape inside relations, and sublime delight. I think by facing the present I can honestly shape my future.