Virtual Exhibition: Kristoffer Ala-Ketola - The Nightspell

SÍM Residency, in collaboration with The Finnish Cultural Foundation, presents The Nightspell, a solo exhibition by artist-in-residence Kristoffer Ala-Ketola.

Originally on view at SÍM Gallery in September 2025, the exhibition is now available as a virtual experience.

Follow the link to enter the virtual exhibition https://my.matterport.com/show/?m=EpH73YfVmTK

The Nightspell conjures the night in all its mysterious, witchy glory. From the rituals of rave culture, to folkloric sacraments, a shared nocturnal language tells tales of connection and contradiction. Anonymity invites community, fragility resurfaces as strength and the hidden merges with the exposed - as outcasts are reeled in. Well wishes and spells of protection are freely given to those who dare partake.

Kristoffer Ala-Ketola is a multidisciplinary artist based in Helsinki, Finland. He graduated from Yale School of Art with a Master of Fine Arts in sculpture in 2019 and received his Bachelor's degree at the Finnish Academy of Fine Arts in 2016. His work has been exhibited in 4th Ward Project Space in Chicago, Kunsthalle Helsinki, Kunsthalle Turku, Exhibition Centre WeeGee in Espoo and he has also participated in video screenings at the Helsinki International Film Festival and Video Art Festival Turku.

Ala-Ketola's work engages in character building, symbolism, semiotics, various psychological phenomena, speculative futures, and queer theory with recurring themes of emotion, longing, and dreaming. Using moving image, photography, sculpture, installation, painting, and text he anchors his practice in the uncertain forms of existence. Merging fiction, autobiography, and theory into visual language – its signs reflecting and contradicting each other – He creates a vortex of associations through themes of desire, solitude, change, healing, and coping.

Curator: Ástríður Jónsdóttir

Residency granted by The Finnish Cultural Foundation @SuomenKulttuurirahasto