Marking the 70th anniversary of the Pavilion of Finland, commissioner Frame Contemporary Art Finland will present Aeolian Suite by artist Jenna Sutela at the 61st International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia, on view from 9 May to 22 November 2026.
Jenna Sutela, Aeolian Suite, 2026, work in progress. Pavilion of Finland at the 61st Venice Biennale.
Image: Hertta Kiiski, courtesy of Frame Contemporary Art Finland.
Curated by Stefanie Hessler, Aeolian Suite unfolds as a multisensory environment, transforming the pavilion into a windscape of sound and movement. The artwork is composed using meteorological data, musical instruments (such as a clothesline, wind machines, and a children’s woodwinds orchestra), and the winds from Venice, Helsinki, and beyond.
Aeolian Suite explores the ambivalence of the wind—an atmospheric presence that is intangible and unpredictable. Wind transcends earthbound logic while simultaneously being entangled in our lives and a mirror to our planetary impact. It acts as a source of true randomness for computation, divination, and music, and as a carrier of particles, microbes, seeds, and messages.
In this elemental drama set in the Pavilion of Finland, the five Venetian winds—Tramontana, two different Boras, Scirocco, and Garbin—become central protagonists, singing the weather while acting as guides for listening. The characters, styled with hair artist Sara Mathiasson, take on identities inspired by the shifting weather patterns. By personifying the atmospheric forces that shape Venice and the increasingly volatile global climate, the work addresses environmental questions from the mundane to the existential.
The scenography, designed by Celeste Burlina, is set in the spirit of Commedia dell’arte traveling theatre and reflects the history of Alvar and Elissa Aalto’s pavilion from 1956, which was originally intended as a mobile construction. Likewise, the vocal characterization is inspired by grammelot, the art of speaking without words from the same theater tradition, communicating instead through rhythm, tone, and gesture.
Aeolian Suite studies predictive processes, like environmental simulations and weather forecasting, in discussion with scientists at the Institute of Marine Sciences CNR-ISMAR. Simultaneously, it explores mystical and sensorial ways of knowing, like the practice of deep listening. While acknowledging that it is impossible to model a system from within without changing it, the work aims to take a different approach by tuning into the environment.
“Against the logic of noise cancellation and weather prediction, Aeolian Suite embraces the wind’s unpredictability and its fully relational being,” said Jenna Sutela. “We can only hear wind as it blows into, out of, or against things like trees, alleys, flutes, wings, or the Merihaansilta bridge in Helsinki. To listen to the wind, to let it take over the microphone, is a way of staying porous to the world, of recognizing that intelligence moves in more directions than we can see.”
Curator Stefanie Hessler added, “The pavilion whisks us into an expanded conversation with the atmosphere – one that moves between scientific measurement and poetic intuition, between control and surrender. Sutela sensitizes us to forces that exceed human scale while simultaneously summoning us to sound the whispers and roars of the winds with our full sensorium, wit, and languages beyond those known to us as of yet.”
The exhibition at Finland’s Aalto Pavilion is commissioned and produced by Frame Contemporary Art Finland. Oulu2026 European Capital of Culture is the main partner of the exhibition. The Finnish Ministry of Education and Culture is the main supporter of the exhibition. Other supporters include Jane and Aatos Erkko Foundation, Genelec, Kvadrat, Schering Stiftung, Saastamoinen Foundation, EMMA – Espoo Museum of Modern Art, Finnish Embassy in Rome, and Pavilion of Finland Patrons. Event partners include Finnland-Institut in Berlin, TBA21–Academy’s Ocean Space, and Swiss Institute (SI) New York.
The presentation coincides with the Pavilion of Finland’s 70th anniversary year in 2026. It will be accompanied by a publication and record produced in collaboration with Mousse Publishing and PAN record label.
Events
There will be an event with the artist and curator at the Finnland-Institut in Berlin on January 30th.
To RSVP, please contact julia@suttoncomms.com.
Notes to Editors
International Press
Julia Debski, Sutton Communications
julia@suttoncomms.com
Finnish Press
Rosa Kuosmanen, Head of Communications at Frame
rosa.kuosmanen@frame-finland.fi
About Jenna Sutela
Jenna Sutela’s ‘living sculptures’, image, and sound works explore open systems in biology, computation, and language. Sutela graduated from University of Art & Design Helsinki (now Aalto University) in the late 2000s. Originally from Turku, Finland, Sutela is now based in Berlin.
Her work has been presented internationally, including at the Castello di Rivoli, Turin (2025); Centre d’Art Contemporain Genève (2024); Swiss Institute, New York (2023); Helsinki Biennale (2023); Haus der Kunst, Munich (2022); Kiasma Museum of Contemporary Art, Helsinki (2022); Shanghai Biennial (2021); Liverpool Biennial (2021); Kunsthall Trondheim (2020); Serpentine Galleries, London (2019); and Moderna Museet, Stockholm (2019). She has been a visiting artist at La Becque, MIT Center for Art, Science & Technology, Somerset House Studios, and Callie’s Berlin. She is a Jane Lombard Fellow at The New School.
About Stefanie Hessler
Stefanie Hessler is a curator, writer, editor, and the director of Swiss Institute (SI). She has worked with over 300 artists, 50 organizations, and dozens of researchers across all continents. Originally from Germany, she has worked as a curator across exhibitions and biennales from Athens to São Paulo, Kochi to Montreal, Trondheim to Berlin. She has worked with some of the biggest artists of today, including Joan Jonas, Tomas Saraceno, and Christine Sun Kim as well as nurtured careers of emerging artists who are currently having their big break, such as Lap-See Lam, Ali Cherri, and Raven Chacon.
In addition to her role at Swiss Institute, Hessler is the curator of Parcours at Art Basel in Basel, and co-curator of the 2026 Counterpublic Triennial in St. Louis. Previously Hessler served as the Director of Kunsthall Trondheim in Norway. Her selected projects as an independent curator include the 17th Momenta Biennale: Sensing Nature, Montreal; Rising Tides/Down to Earth, Gropius Bau, Berlin; Joan Jonas: Moving Off the Land II, Ocean Space, Venice; the symposium Practices of Attention, 33rd Bienal de São Paulo; and the 6th Athens Biennale. Hessler is the author of Prospecting Ocean (MIT Press) and has edited over a dozen volumes.
About Frame Contemporary Art Finland
Frame Contemporary Art Finland, an advocate for Finnish contemporary art, has served as the commissioner of the Aalto Pavilion of Finland since 2013. Frame supports international initiatives and fosters professional exchange, encouraging the critical development of the field through grants, a visitor programme, curator residencies, seminars and talks, exhibition collaborations, and network platforms. 2026 marks the Aalto Pavilion of Finland’s 70th anniversary.