Series of 40 photographs (pigment ink print, typewritten text, 2022)
Roadside narratives (2022) is the title piece in Maija Blåfield’s retrospective solo exhibition in Helsinki’s Taidehalli 19.1.-5.3.2023.
Roadside Narratives is a series of road movie scenes presented in the form of photographs and written stories.
The scenes unfolding through the images and stories depict small-scale revelations and observations from the margins of lived events, documented on the road or within everyday aesthetic surroundings. The pieces of writing accompanying the photos touch upon and ponder in different ways the significance of recording and filming, place, and journey-making.
The short stories and poems in the series meet with documentary snapshots that were recorded on journeys of different durations – from mushroom picking to a cross-continent road trip. The filming locations are not recognisable, nor are they told, but each image is marked with the date of its capture. In addition to the photographs taken over the course of 25 years, the series also includes one photo taken by a 10-year-old Blåfield.
