Opening on the West Wall Gallery: 17. October, 5pm
In the past two months I have been swimming in Seyðis4örður, Iceland, and think about sensa=ons. As I hike up to the mountains, the lines of the rivers, water falls, lakes all twirl together into land and ocean. Traces of human sense and hints of nature’s twist all started to came to gather on paper. Here rust fragments of a defunct fish factory were used to make these echoes of imagina=on, figures of a swimmer’s stroke.
Lin Ni (Last, First; b. 1994; TW/FI; they/her) is an emerging, neurodivergent, LGBTQ+ , BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and People of Color)and non-binary idenBfied, diasporic Taiwanese, immigrant, mulBdisciplinary trans-woman arBst, filmmaker, and doctoral researcher at the Faculty of Art and Design, University of Lapland, Finland. She holds an MA in Sustainable Art and Design from the University of Lapland, Finland, and a BA in Architecture from the Architectural AssociaBon School of Architecture in London. She approaches her subject through physical and ficBonal inserBons into liquid bodies such as Bme, space and water. Her research project Radical Re-Decolonizing Deep Par=cipatory Wet Ac=on Research is exploring the decolonizaBon of nature through the entangled case of Seyðis_örður’s subsea oil leak. It invesBgates how the Icelandic _ord waters remain haunted by colonial histories between the First and Second World Wars—parBcularly through oil extracBon by companies such as Eagle Oil and Shipping. Ironically, the oil leak has also protected the _ord from salmon farm development proposals. Through breathing and awareness exercises supported by underwater fieldwork conducted at the site, parBcipants collecBvely dive into the realiBes of re-inhabitaBon. She began this project in autumn 2025 during the arBst residency at Skagfell Art Center in Seyðis_örður, Iceland. The work fosters dialogue through parBcipatory performance, engaging global and regional awareness of sustainable transiBons in relaBon to anthropocentric impacts underwater. During the residency, she studied the oil barrier structures installed at the spill site and the environmental impact of the incident through underwater fieldwork. She also invesBgated the underwater infrastructure of internet cables that connect global telecommunicaBon networks, examining their poliBcal, environmental, and security implicaBons. Through fieldwork, she gained a deeper understanding of the systems that enable near-instant global communicaBon and began to quesBon what happens when these deep-sea cables are cut—either intenBonally or accidentally by deep-sea trawling. Two subsea cables, Far North Fiber (FNF) and Polar Connect, are expected to enter service across the ArcBc region toward East Asia by 2027 and 2030, as reported by Nordic naBonal research and educaBon networks (NRENs), NORDUnet, and their partners (NORDUnet, 2024). Amidst these mulBdimensional urgencies, this development presents a unique co-research opportunity. She has confirmed ongoing partnerships with LungA Radio School in Iceland, ASAD (The ArcBc Sustainable Arts and Design Network), and UArcBc (The University of the ArcBc Network) to explore how socially engaged art and science collaboraBons can foster internaBonal dialogue and raise ecological awareness across neighboring regions through her research producBons.
