The Sauna Belt explores and studies the American-Finnish diaspora through Finnish eyes. Up to half a million Finnish immigrants immigrated to America at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries and most of them settled in northern Minnesota, Wisconsin, and the Upper Peninsula of Michigan.

I live and grew up in an area where most of the immigrants left 100-150 years ago. Finnishness has remained amazingly strong in the region, even though the language is almost dead. I call it American-Finnish parallel reality.

I am inspired by a dream-like feeling of an unknown combination of Finnish and American cultures where familiar things were in a strange order. The people looks like my relatives and neighbours. Many things remind me of home, but something doesn't make sense. Many people from there who have visited Finland have told me about a similar experience.

It is said that in the diaspora, many cultures traits becomes stronger and the development even stops, while the culture in the country of origin continues its evolution. I am interested in national traumas, intergenerationalism and mystery.

After my first trip in 2017, I have made seven trips and spent a total of 4-5 months in the area.

My way of working is based on sociality, wandering and wondering, dwelling and lingering. I've found people through genealogy, by making friends with strangers, making friends with their friends, and people purely based on appearance.

These trips gave me a view of both cultures, the past of Finnish culture and today's reality rural America. What I see is a kind of "layering" or traces in the cultural landscape. Most of the migration of Finns to Michigan UP, Northern Minnesota, and Wisconsin happened more than 100 years ago, but many things that I am familiar with as a Finn can still be recognized from the environment or the people I meet.

I am fascinated by connecting dots between realities, families and ideas. I'm an outsider, but I don't study a culture completely unknown to me. I'm like a relative from the past. Maybe I'm from the future too.