Forward-Looking: Interview with Kaarina Gould

For nearly five years, Executive Director Kaarina Gould has worked with the FCINY team to shepherd the legacy of the 30-year-old institution forward. Next month, she embarks on a new professional journey to lead the process of founding the future Architecture and Design Museum in Finland. Curator, educator, and writer Tiffany Lambert caught up with Gould to reflect on her tenure at the helm of an institute that has advanced an innovative agenda while maintaining roots in the community it serves. Their conversation sheds light on the importance of cross-cultural dialogues, Gould’s continued connection with the Institute, and keeping momentum alive in creating opportunities for practitioners in the arts.

Tiffany Lambert: As you prepare to move on from your current position with FCINY, could you talk about your time with the Institute?

Kaarina Gould: I started in this position in the fall of 2016. I moved to New York three weeks prior to the election and, of course, there was a massive shift in the atmosphere. At that moment, what we do as an institution, I think, became even more acutely important. Like many in the creative fields, we felt the urgent need to say something, and somehow state that we are not giving in, and we want to manifest things that are good for people and for the planet. Now, within the current political climate, it is easier to breathe. But the pandemic has brought a new need to make sure our work is relevant.

TL: It’s quite something that your time has been bookended by two major cultural inflection points: the 2016 US election and the COVID-19 pandemic. Despite the challenges, the institution has proven to be agile and adaptable within these shifting contexts, creating dynamic public programs that engage some of the most urgent topics today—from technology to social equity. Are there certain types of programs you’ve introduced or emphasized?

KG: Working across the fields of design, architecture, and contemporary art, I have wanted to take a holistic, multidisciplinary approach to these disciplines and to create a project every year that raises awareness about what we do and builds a stronger network around the Institute. One of the signature projects during my time was the Zero Waste Bistro, presented in 2018 as part of NYCxDESIGN, which tackled issues around climate change from the perspective of food and design. It looked at the idea of a circular economy and how important that is in the industry. The project created a mini lab of what hospitality could be if it could be done with zero waste.

Another project that has been personally important to me is the Bastard Cookbook that we published a couple of years ago, which is a collaboration between a Finnish chef, Antto Melasniemi, and the New York and Thailand based artist, Rirkrit Tiravanija. The book is, in my opinion, a wonderful combination of a photo essay, a cookbook, and a survey into what authenticity means in today’s culture and society. The common denominator between those two projects is food—how people consume and think about food and the space of food industries—which is a massive factor in the future of our planet, but also a great element in bringing people together and creating conversation around these important themes.

TL: In addition to the public programming, the Institute also has a robust and innovative residency program, with a history that stretches back to the organization’s founding. Has the pandemic helped further the Institute’s commitment to creating multivalent opportunities for designers, architects, and artists?

KG: The second layer of what we do at the Institute stems from the mobility and the residency programs. That has been at the core of our activities for over 30 years—we’ve been hosting residencies in New York for Finnish and Finland-based designers, architects, and artists since 1990. During three decades, hundreds of people have participated and benefited from these programs. In recent years, more and more, we’ve been focusing on building bilateral programs where we also host artists, curators, and experts from the United States in Finland, supporting these practitioners and facilitating dialogue and peer learning.

The pandemic, of course, has put an organization with mobility at the core of its mission in a very challenging spot, and there’s been an urgent need to rethink and restructure the residency programs, which for now have been mostly halted due to the travel restrictions.

We have been considering how to create alternative ways of building dialogue when in-person meetings and, especially, travel has become not just restricted but almost impossible. I can’t say that’s something we’ve solved during this year but we’ll continue exploring. Even with these challenges, we still strongly believe in mobility, and in bringing people together around the same table, whether it’s a physical table or a virtual table, to learn from each other and share experiences and practices. That is at the very core of our mission.

TL: What do you hope to see for the Institute’s future?

KG: During the past couple of years I’ve invited a group of people to serve on the new International Advisory Board of the Institute, experts and professionals from the fields of architecture and design and contemporary art. The idea behind that is to, in part, make the Institute more rooted here in New York and the US.

We announced the group just prior to the pandemic, so we haven’t really gotten into full speed with the work of the Advisory Board yet. As I’m now moving forward from the position of the Director of the Institute, I was asked to join the Advisory Board, which I’m super happy to be part of. I get to continue working with the Institute and maintain a connection. It will be important to consider what kinds of ways we’re going to find for the members to support the institution, and to open doors to their networks and bring ideas to what the Institute’s role could be in the future.

TL: Starting in May you will begin a new role leading the process of building a new museum for architecture and design in Finland. Can you talk about that a bit more?

KG: My next professional chapter will be leading the process of founding a new Museum of Architecture and Design in Finland. Finland is known as a country of design and architecture, but yet the facilities of the current museums representing those fields, the Museum of Finnish Architecture and the Design Museum, are not what a 21st century museum should necessarily be. They don’t serve the expectations of the public and the expectations that the world has for Finland as a forerunner in design and architecture.

Currently we’re in a situation where preparations for building a new museum have been going on in one way or the other for decades. Some plans have gone further than others, but now, for the first time, there’s political will and also financial commitments, both from the City of Helsinki and the Finnish Government through the Ministry of Education and Culture and significant donations from several private foundations. So the work can begin.

TL: It speaks volumes that Finland will be constructing a new architecture and design museum as part of the post-pandemic recovery package.

KG: We now really have the momentum to make the museum happen. It is especially inspiring—and humbling too—to be contributing to something so meaningful that will hopefully be there for many generations to come. I hope we can come up with a radical concept for a museum of the future for design and architecture. Something that redefines the concept of a museum and its role in society. The work will also be shaped by newly gained perspectives from the challenges that the pandemic has brought to all cultural institutions, where finding ways of encountering audiences and groups beyond the museum building is more and more important.

The museum will be located in the South Harbor area in Helsinki, which is a very central area by the sea near the old marketplace. The new museum building is connected to a complete redevelopment of that area, so the city’s determination to redevelop that area is one of the factors why this museum project is now moving forward with such speed and commitment.

TL: Given the approach to conceptualizing the role of a museum today, there are of course more conversations to be had beyond the architect of the building. But will there be a competition to select the architect and the team that will help bring this concept into reality?

KG: An ideas competition for the South Harbor area will be opened this spring, which will seek for a concept to redevelop the district around the future museum. Later an architectural competition will be opened for the museum building.

TL: There is also the work of integrating the staff and the collections of two currently separate museums.

KG: Yes, there are two existing museums—The Museum of Finnish Architecture and the Design Museum—that will merge into one. The aim is not to just put one and one together, but to actually build something completely new. So it’s also a big organizational cultivation process that we’re about to enter that I find super interesting.

TL: How do you see the dialogue between Finland and the US evolving? There’s such a rich history there.

KG: That is a good question. One aspect that we have been thinking about a lot as an institution in the past year is diversity and inclusion, owing a lot of that conversation to the ongoing work of the Black Lives Matter movement. We’ve been asking many fundamental questions, such as how could we, as an institution focusing on visual arts, be part of that conversation in a meaningful and sensitive way? How can we, as an institution that works at the crossroads of two cultures, examine cross-cultural diversity and inclusion efforts in a way that creates sharing and learning?

Having been present in New York for over 30 years, the Institute is immersed in the city’s deep history of advocacy, protest, and social change for racial justice. In Finland, we don’t have a similar history and there isn’t as strong a tradition of debate on these issues in our society, even though we have diversity, inclusion, and equity issues as well that we are facing.

We’ve been investing in internal work to build strong diversity and inclusion efforts at this point, not just with the Institute, but also with the network of other Finnish cultural and academic institutions, all of which work in very different environments, countries, cities, and cultures.

Then, of course, working with design, architecture, and contemporary art, many Finnish practitioners and Nordic practitioners are focused on different aspects of sustainability and climate justice. So that’s something that we’ve been trying to bring into the conversation within the United States and highlight these aspects of Nordic society and culture within US design, architecture, and contemporary art.

TL: Were some of these conversations the impetus for revising the Institute’s mission?

KG: We probably would have re-examined and updated our mission at one point, but I think the pandemic triggered a need to really rethink our strategy and our mission. It felt like everything around us was in such a massive flux that we as an Institute couldn’t stay static. So we underwent a pretty profound strategic planning process last fall with the help of outside experts, the team, and the board. Together, we revisited our mission and developed a strategic statement reflecting our commitment to diversity and inclusion.

The efforts and intentions of the full team can be seen very clearly in the outcome. I think in general, for any cultural institution, last year necessitated the need to justify our reason for being, our purpose, and the work we do in the face of extraordinary challenges. Of course, that justification cannot just be on paper, it needs to manifest through our actions, programming, and residencies. Currently, the whole world is still a little bit in slow motion in terms of action, but we hope to get there. I believe that, when it is time to move quickly, the Institute will be ready to lead.

Kaarina Gould’s interview took place in April, 2021, virtually in Brooklyn, NY.

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