working progress publicity photos in collaboration with Joonas Sdiri

FLIES AND HONEY - THE PROJECT

Flies and Honey emerges at the intersection of personal symbolism, ritual aesthetics and textile-based storytelling. Rooted in the transformation of the everyday, the project reimagines garments - especially the overlooked or mass-produced - as vessels of memory, resistance and self-expression.

The sweatshirt - often linked to uniformity and casual anonymity - is reclaimed as an artistic medium. Each piece becomes a tactile archive, bearing emotional weight and societal commentary. By elevating the commonplace, Flies and Honey collapses the divide between high art and everyday wear, challenging the hierarchies that govern both fashion and contemporary art.

The modularity of the textile sculptures - their ability to be assembled, disassembled and rearranged - reflects the fluidity of selfhood and the impermanence of social roles. Heraldic symbols, masks, and shields conjure ancestral narratives and speculative identities. They hint at timeless forms of protection, belonging and visibility.

Visually and thematically, Flies and Honey draws from folk traditions, puppet theatre and ritual performance. These references anchor the work in collective memory while enabling playful, critical disruptions of present-day consumer culture. The aesthetic of excess - through vibrant color, exaggerated form and dense layering - serves as both camouflage and amplification. It allows the figures to vanish into spectacle or assert themselves with ceremonial boldness.

The exhibition operates as a hybrid environment, resisting fixed definitions. It invites audiences into an unfolding ceremony, where interaction becomes part of the work itself. Photography expand the narrative, capturing performative moments that reveal the slow construction of identity through material, movement and gesture.

Ultimately, Flies and Honey frames textile as a political and poetic language - one that resists disposability, embraces contradiction and reclaims intimacy and agency in a world increasingly defined by speed, abstraction  and detachment.

Purpose and Goal. The aim is to embody a dynamic and thought-provoking concept at the intersection of art, design, and fashion. Presented in site-specific installations, the works unfold in dialogue with one another, where bodies and formations interact to create a living, narrative space.

COLLABORATIONS

Graphic work for the titling of the pieces – a kind of universal phonology
(with Jaakko Suomalainen)

A fictional system of symbols that replaces written language and represents both sound and image — each symbol possessing its own unique form and an invented pronunciation. The system aims to establish a universal mode of expression — one that invites the viewer to interpret the symbols freely by personal perception and association. Parallels can be drawn to the Rorschach test and to the structure of Roman numerals.

Through geometric operations — addition, subtraction, multiplication — each symbol evolves from the one before it, forming a visual sequence or a silent rhythm.

Every symbol is followed by a phonetic echo — [ eii_usc;;.huu ] — a "residue of voice" that extends the symbol's presence beyond the visual.
The written pronunciation [ ] also facilitates communication of the works' titles in publications and on social media, since the symbols themselves cannot be produced using a standard keyboard.

Together, they form a universal phonology: a speculative language of form, sound, and imagination.


Earlier related project: Form Variations with the Cube as a Starting Point (Basic Design, 2000).

Through geometric transformations, the cube undergoes a series of positive and negative operations that generate new configurations.


Each variation appears as an independent form, yet all remain connectable — distinct yet related, like fragments of a shared syntax. Through repetition and systematic alteration, the process itself becomes a language.


Further development In a further phase of development, the symbol system will be integrated into a project featuring screen prints and hand-painted motifs on recycled textile garments and accessories during spring 2026.


The symbols will also appear in a photographic project in collaboration with Joonas Sdiri.
This work draws inspiration from Lavinia Schulz and Walter Holdt, whose expressionist costumes in 1920s Hamburg evoke retro-robotic figures and Bauhaus knights.


Similarly, the works from Flies and Honey aim to convey a ritual, choreographic ceremony: two dancers gradually dress themselves in the modular textile sculptures, piece by piece. The visual language is predominantly black and white, punctuated by carefully chosen color elements.

THE CORE VALUES OF JENNYVEXALA

Pleasure. Perfection is irrelevant; the process is fundamental. Embrace creative play and joy. Foster curiosity. Work with contrasts in expression, form and colour. Build imagery and stories.

Patience. Honour traditions and the craftsmanship of working by hand. Emphasise and visualise the value of a slow, meticulous process, where persistence becomes a virtue. Repetition creates space for focus and reflection.

Authenticity. Safeguard integrity and strength through consistency and sincerity. Define and express identity. Boldly explore layers, shifts and sensual contrasts.

Sustainability. Challenge and influence conventional artistic expression. Promote a more sustainable approach to the environment. Break down social norms and conventions. Reuse and the availability of materials set boundaries - limitations that in turn spark creativity and imagination.