chance encounter

chance encounter

Jaakko Pallasvuo
Nestori Syrjälä
Bogna Luiza Wiśniewska

15 - 21 June 2025
2pm - midnight
Basel Social Club
Rittergasse 21-25, CH-4051 Basel

Finnland-Institut in Berlin and Finnish Cultural Institute in New York (FCINY) are excited to present chance encounter, a project bringing together three new commissions by Finland-based artists Jaakko Pallasvuo, Nestori Syrjälä and Bogna Luiza Wiśniewska as part of Basel Social Club 2025. The project, curated by Mirjami Schuppert (Finnland-Institut) and Elina Suoyrjö (FCINY) is a spin-off from Limits to Growth, a project realised with the same artists at NADA Miami in 2024, curated by Elina Suoyrjö.

Responding to the concept of ‘value systems’, the overarching theme of this year’s Basel Social Club, the newly produced works lurk in the shadows, negotiating their relationship to both the visitors of the event, and the past of the curious building hosting them. Arranged at a different location each year, in 2025 Basel Social Club houses a former bank building located in the heart of the city’s old town, surrounded by both wealth and tradition.

All artists in the project approach systems of value from distinct perspectives. Jaakko Pallasvuo’s installation Fortune (2025) discusses the topics of chance, risk, and probability through a sound piece and visual elements. The text combines the artist’s own writing with quotes from Steve Miller Band, Giorgio Agamben, Simone Weil, Marcel Duchamp, and Georges Bataille, to name a few. Performed by Colin Self, the audio piece offers ruminations on the limited impact of our intentions. A monologue fills the room at sporadic intervals, leaving behind a vacuum when silenced.

Tapping into the locality of the site, as well as the exchange value of gossip, Nestori Syrjälä’s performative work I USED TO WORK HERE (2025) recounts rumours of a fictional former employee of the bank, who allegedly gave up banking due to ecological motives in turbulent circumstances, burning bridges behind them. The visitors may encounter the performance daily at various sites in the building.

Bogna Luiza Wiśniewska’s installation May fortune smile upon you (2025) provides respite from the fast paced, spiralling quest for productivity, mirroring the numerous fountains to be found on the sidewalks and squares of the city. Building on Wiśniewska’s artistic practice rooted in hospitality, kindness and care, and focusing on belief systems related to search for success and good luck, the artist presents a well-wishing character that brings visitors together over a shared cup of soothing tea.

Cashing in on one of the most significant art market gatherings in Europe, Basel Social Club offers a counterweight to the commercial art fair through free entry, a rich presentation of art and artists, including artist-led initiatives, whose means to participate in the  international art fairs are limited,  and a spirit of conviviality. chance encounter acts as part of it, as a site for coming together over listening, discussing, and sharing. Basel Social Club is rooted in the city, its history, lived experience, and locality. Through inclusion in the Club, the three new commissions contribute to the creation of a space for resistance, where the value-systems that govern the commercial art circuit are challenged.

Jaakko Pallasvuo (b. 1333) is an artist and writer living in Helsinki. Pallasvuo’s works are not about anything. Pieces from this random, restless body of work have been exhibited at the 14th Baltic Triennial, BOZAR, Frankfurter Kunstverein and Museum of Modern Art in Warsaw, among other places. Pallasvuo publishes microessays on the popular Instagram account @avocado_ibuprofen, and has written for publications such as The Whitney Review and transmediale journal.

Nestori Syrjälä works with sculpture, installation and public interventions. For the past ten years he has been obsessed with the crisis in human relations with the environment: the ground under our feet, the air we breathe and the oceans that surround us are all turning strange. Syrjälä´s work explores this strangeness through his sculptural practice as well as through social situations created in public space. Syrjälä has studied sculpture in the Finnish Academy of Fine Arts and the Royal Institute of Art in Sweden. His work has been shown in Museum of Contemporary Art Kiasma, Matadero Madrid and Gwangju Biennale.

Bogna Luiza Wiśniewska (b.1988, Poland) is a soft-hearted person who lives and works in Helsinki, where she maintains an arts practice that fosters cosy spaces and good company, bringing people together through painting, ceramics, textiles, exhibition-making, installation, cooking, gardening and hosting. Her practice is rooted in care, kindness, fragility, queerness and the exploration of these elements through various mediums. She is actively involved in the Helsinki art scene and part of artist-run gallery SIC.

Basel Social Club is a unique and dynamic platform taking place during Art Basel week. Held in a different venue each year, the event brings together art, social life, and entertainment, positioning itself as a compelling alternative to traditional art fairs. By uniting galleries of various scales and artists from diverse backgrounds, the event aspires to create an inclusive and multifaceted art environment. Basel Social Club is free and open to all.

The Finnland-Institut is a forum for Finnish culture, academia and business in German-speaking Europe. The Institute emphasises on networking and counselling of actors from different disciplines and offers, in co-operation with its partners, a diverse programme providing insights into Finland's culture and society.

chance encounter is organized collaboratively by Finnland-Institut and the Finnish Cultural Institute in New York as part of the pARTir initiative funded by the European Union – NextGenerationEU.