above: Auditorium 1 after renovation, seen from upper gallery;
below: spiral staircase with backdoor entrances; all photos HHW.

Kenneth, having swept the front porch free from ice and sand, leaves his broom at the caretaker’s office and heads for coffee, too.

Messages on notice boards remind us about this and that; to wash hands, apply for grants, go dancing, travel abroad, have psychotherapy in group, stay home when sick.

“Is this all? Yes/No/Probably”

All photos by HHW.

“Hanken” awakening; all photos HHW.

Morning light is about to catch up with electricity. The Business School building begins to resound with footsteps, voices, doors opening and closing; movement, life. In Auditorium 1, renovation work is going on. Smell of fresh paint mingles with the warm scent of coffee. Outside, someone leaves the shovel in a heap of snow to take a break.

From the spiral staircase; photos HHW.

A crack in the glass of the cafeteria door. A row of garbage bins and a vacuum cleaner on the second floor.
Disturbances?

 

“Hanken” corridors and staircase at night; all photos HHW.

Early morning; the light of dawn cannot yet compete with effective fluorescent tubes. They keep the house awake all through the night, even in the absence of people.

“Hanken” entrance hall in 2011; photo HHW.

Almost fifty years later – the Business School entrance hall in 2011.
People have their ways, living their lives… doing their best. Still, far from perfect.
Hey Woldemar – how do we fit into the image?

“Hanken” entrance hall in 1963, framed original photograph in corridor; photo HHW.

A black-and-white photograph, showing the entrance hall of the brand new Business School in 1963. So, this is how it was meant to be: clean, straight-lined and flooded with light; a space framed and barred where submissive nature thrives in its allotted place and humans are the subjects of Enlightenment.

Åbo Akademi University Business School, light and spaces; all photos by HHW.

The Business School building: a functionalistic work by Åbo Akademi architect Woldemar Baeckman. Built in 1963, it emphatically expresses a positivistic vision, carried by the craftsman’s knowledge of materials as well as the relative scarcity of the time. An appropriate setting for anyone who would wish to make a comment, philosophically or by means of art, to the contemporary state of things; the mind-set of Enlightenment taken to, and beyond, its utmost consequences.
Here the LICHTWECHSEL exhibition will take place, opening on March 17, 2011.

Åbo Akademi University Business School, entrance from above; photo by HHW.

Åbo Akademi University Business School, one January morning;
photo HHW.

And here’s the next project: in March, the Nomadic University will stage an art event at Åbo Akademi University Business School.
Austrian artists Luise Kloos, Erika Lojen, Aurelia Meinhart and Ingeborg Pock will bring their art journey – from Graz via Vilnius, Riga, Tallinn and Helsinki to Åbo/Turku – into the modernistic white building known as Hanken in Åbo/Turku.