Siphon, a multimedia installation created by Helsinki-based artist Tuomas A. Laitinen, draws on more than a decade of research in octopus intelligence, sleep, and consciousness.
Developed in collaboration with neuroscientist Sam Reiter of the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology (OIST) and produced with guidance and support by PALO, the exhibition centers on a multichannel, titular video work that ensconces viewers within kaleidoscopic, 8K imagery of the shifting camouflage patterns, skin textures, and colors of octopuses. The immersive video, which includes both original footage and recordings by OIST of octopus sleep patterns, depicts the cephalopod’s distinct shapeshifting habits as they progress between rest and transformation. Scaled dramatically and edited into a continuous visual landscape, it captures multiple octopus bodies merging into a single undulating, painterly terrain. As Laitinen describes it, the work is intended to be experienced not only visually but physically, something viewers "feel in the body."
At the center of the exhibition, water-filled tanks contain tubular, blown-glass sculptures, conceived by the artist as speculative proposals for octopuses. These sculptural forms are activated through site-specific arrangements by renowned 86-year-old Japanese ikebana master Kosen Ohtsubo, whose experimental compositions create an unexpected dialogue between marine biology, contemporary sculpture, and centuries-old floral traditions. Beyond the gallery confines, a “tentacular” spatial audio installation, titled 8Eternal, spills across the three-storied Main Hall of Pioneer Works. Intended to evoke the eight arms of an octopus, the work incorporates vocals by Kenyan composer Nyokabi Kariuki and is structured around an eight-note "octachord." Using advanced directional audio technology, eight ultrasonic speakers positioned throughout the space emit highly concentrated beams of sound rather than broadcasting uniformly through the room, creating the effect of creeping tentacles of sound. As visitors move through the installation, they encounter shifting fragments of the composition that appear and disappear according to their position in the installation.
More than ten years in development, Siphon began with Laitinen's investigation of the mythologies and geopolitics of copper, the conductive element that powers modern technological infrastructure. This research led the artist to explore circulatory systems across biological and technological scales, ultimately revealing an unexpected connection: octopuses rely on copper-based blood chemistry to efficiently transport oxygen in deep-ocean environments. From this discovery emerged a broader artistic inquiry into the octopus's decentralized nervous system, distributed intelligence, and unique sensory capacities, and led Laitinento connect with researchers studying the octopus brain in Okinawa, Japan. The research and footage collected during this time was then refined and edited during Laitinen’s Visual Arts residency at Pioneer Works in the Fall of 2024, in collaboration with Florenz.
These investigations have become a lens through which Laitinen examines larger questions intoneuroscience, consciousness, philosophy, and ecological interconnectedness. Bringing together scientific research, contemporary art, and Japanese cultural traditions, Siphon invites audiences to consider what non-human forms of intelligence might reveal about perception, awareness, and our relationship to the natural world.
About the Artists
Tuomas A. Laitinen is an artist working with moving images, sound, and glass. His practice composes installations and situations that inquire into the interconnectedness of language and the body across continuously morphing environments. Recent works employ glass as both vessel and threshold, a material that mediates proximity, containment, and transmission, while ultrasonic frequencies are emitted in space as spectral agents operating at the limits of perception. Drawing from heterogeneous mythologies and embodied forms of knowledge, Laitinen creates hallucinatory registers in which perception is continually displaced and reorganized through nonlinear experience.
Working also as the composer TAL, Laitinen released his debut album Sapiduz (Öm Sound / Svart Records) in 2022. The record assembles traces of early music, mutated vocals, and granular electronic composition into a densely layered sonic tapestry, extending concerns that recur throughout his installation practice. Laitinen's works have recently been shown in the 21st Biennale of Sydney, Avesta Art 2026, 7th Bucharest Biennale, Screen City Biennale 2019 (Stavanger), SADE LA (Los Angeles), Amado Art Space (Seoul), A Tale of a Tub (Rotterdam), Art Sonje Center (Seoul), Helsinki Contemporary, Museum of Contemporary Art Kiasma, EMMA – Espoo Museum of Modern Art, MOCA Shanghai & Cinemateca do MAM Rio de Janeiro.
Kosen Ohtsubo is a Japanese ikebana artist. Active for more than six decades, he has worked widely in Japan and abroad. Over many years in the education department of Ikebana Ryuseiha, Ohtsubo pursued the technical and formal traditions of ikebana while teaching generations of students. At the same time, his practice includes a wide range of avant-garde ikebana works, from small compositions to spatial installations. He frequently uses vegetables and discarded objects, often working with deliberately simple methods. A lifelong jazz enthusiast, he values improvisation and responsiveness, often allowing materials and circumstances to shape the final form of a work. His work has been presented internationally, including recent exhibitions at Kunstverein MĂĽnchen and the Shanghai Biennale. He lives and works at Flower Planet, his studio in Saitama, Japan.
About PALO
PALO is a Helsinki-based art agency founded by Stéphane Querrec to support visual artists, filmmakers, and musicians from Finland. The organization previously co-produced the "Sonic Tonic" episode with the Performa Biennial in 2023 and partnered with foreign organizations on artist co-commissions, most recently with Anu Pennanen, Antye-Greie-Ripatti aka AGF, Dave McKenzie and Rhea Dillon.