Arilyn Blog

Kouvola city museum Poikilo exhibits life in Kouvola, Finland, starting from the 17th century in its newest exhibition, Manors of Kouvola. The daily lives and the festivities at the noble manors peek through from the times passed into today.

The exhibition also features an augmented reality route. The visitors get to see a glance from the history of Kymenlaakso and its people brought into today.

Citycon, a leading owner, manager, and developer of mixed-use centers for urban living in the Nordics, is building a new and improved shopping center Lippulaiva in Espoonlahti, Espoo, Finland. Lippulaiva will serve various daily needs - everything from everyday shopping to housing, daycare, and public transport.

Besides making running everyday errands easier, Citycon is also committed to sustainability. Lippulaiva has opened a virtual showroom to bring the ideology and the still-in-construction shopping center closer to future visitors.

This year has brought many challenges to visual artists. How to reach the audience when galleries are closed and people won't leave their homes?

The global lockdown has accelerated the development and adoption of technology. Not only in communication but also the entertainment and arts field. Immersive technologies have made it possible for people everywhere to interact with their favourite artists, even while physically apart. 

In a discussion regarding the Metaverse in the X Reality Day webcast, held in November 2020, something stuck with me. Fifty years ago, making videos was expensive, timely, and demanding. Today, anyone can (and everyone does) run a vlog on Youtube. Similarly, as with video production, the tools for AR creation need to match with the mass's know-how for the technology to become a norm.

An average Joe's platform is needed for marketers and advertisers to have equal access to make AR experiences. No coding, no further understanding of the technology itself. Just easy and fun content creation.

You don't need or even want to know how the image algorithms work in Photoshop, so why should you know the technologies inside an AR platform?

The infamous year of 2020 has changed almost everything in our lives - at least the cultural aspect. Galleries and museums are struggling with the loss of audience and visual artists from not displaying their work. 

Today, we're at the dawn of something new, as a visual artist Jani Leinonen is one of the first in the frontline to try out a novel way of displaying art.

We rarely get an opportunity to explore the mysteries of ancient Egypt. Even more rarely, we can immerse ourselves in them. Today we can.

Amos Rex is a museum where the past, the present, and the future meet. In 2020 the museum exhibited the foundation of our society: the glory of Egypt. A never-before-seen experience, a virtual ancient tomb, sends visitors off on a journey thousands of years back in time.

For over a decade, Arabia Street Festival has brought music, food, and art to the streets of the Arabia area in Helsinki, Finland. The annual festival celebrates communality and sustainability, and street art has been in its focus since the beginning. 

13th of its kind, the festival organised on the 5th of September 2020 went online for the first time. In addition to the online program, the festival audience could, and still can, walk around the Arabia area to explore the gorgeous public art. This year, nine street art pieces enhanced with augmented reality decorate the streets and buildings.

For Finnish graphic artist Seela Petra, public art means action for collective well-being. Through art, stories about changes in nature, wild youth, child's play, love, and ageing become alive.

Seela Petra's artwork One Day is a collection of characters and scenes inspired by the Tapiola area in Espoo, Finland. The piece was created in 2019 as a part of Tapiola's new bicycle parking at the AINOA shopping centre, collaborating with Espoo Museum of Modern Art EMMA. Now, the artwork comes alive with augmented reality.

Helsinki Synth City Festival is an annual music event. The festival is organised by the Helsinki Synth City artist collective, a group of independent, uncompromising, and like-minded artists.

In 2019, the very first Helsinki Synth City Festival took place in Ääniwalli, Helsinki. The organisers wanted to bring a new wing to the marketing, so an AR-enhanced ticket competition was arranged.

Pasi Rauhala is a Finnish media artist, who works with 3D, augmented reality, space, ready-made objects, video, photography, installations, and performances. Rauhala's works are often spatial and come into existence with the viewer's presence. 

Here presented are his AR works: Engine, Concrete Pixel, Flamigos, and Machina de Facto.