Aapo Nikkanen
Artist, CD/AD, and Writer in Paris
About
I'm an artist, creative & art director, and a writer. I approach these three practices as a unified whole, in which each of the parts nourishes the other. This approach has allowed me to collaborate with different structures, including holding exhibitions in museums, advising well-known luxury brands, consulting tech startups, designing concept stores, and even creating stamps for the French Post Office.
In addition to my creative work, I write articles, lecture, and participate in panels in several leading art and design universities and institutes across Europe.
- 10+ years of working as an artist and exhibiting in international art institutions (museums, art centers, biennales, festivals).
- 7+ years working in brand development and creative & art direction for organizations in the arts, fashion, luxury, tech, and creative fields (both on and offline).
- Experience in lecturing and leading research projects with prominent international organizations and universities.
- Consultant for Web3 projects, ranging from self-custody wallets to DIDs (2021-).
- Co-founder and co-director of HAVE/NEED, a critical research platform for fashion (2023-).
- Co-founder and Director of Art of The Community Paris (2016-2020).
- Director of Art in The Community Think Thank (2017-2020).
During my free time, I climb rocks, surf waves, and run a small hypnotherapy cabinet.
Projects
Brand communication strategy and product UI/UX consultant for Sparks DAO, a project building an ethical digital identity wallet.
Set design for The New York Times Style Magazine shoot.
Set designer for Camper SS2021 Campaign.
I worked together with photographer Osma Harvilahti to come up with concepts and then produced them for shoots for Camper's international spring-summer campaign of 2021. The campaign titled “The Walking Society”, was shot in Sicily and included a global reach through posters, billboards, store advertisements, an online campaign, and a magazine that was distributed in all the camper stores worldwide.
Head of research commissioned by The Finnish Academic and Cultural Institute's Network dealing with the sustainability issues in the fashion and garment industry.
Creative lead in the creation of the brand website and online store by The Think Tank.
Phipps was founded by Spencer Phipps in Paris in 2018. The brand was selected as a finalist for the LVMH prize in 2019 and was accepted into the official Paris Fashion Week calendar that same year. From its inception, PHIPPS has been defining its own rules for contemporary fashion and setting the modern example of an authentically responsible business, showing that the global consciousness can go far beyond the way a piece of clothing is made.
Creative Direction in the creation of the Koché Shanghai store by The Think Tank.
Koché is a fashion brand established in Paris by Christelle Kocher in 2015. The brand shows its collections at Paris Fashion Week and has also organized shows in New York, Tokyo, Milan, and Marseille. Koché regularly collaborates with major international brands such as Nike, Puma, Pucci, and Converse.
Creative Direction for Novembre Magazine Showroom concepts during 2017 - 2018 at The Community Paris.
Creative Direction and project management for “Le Sud Bébé!”, a multi-venue exhibition, installation, and publication produced by The Community for Koché and OpenMyMed Prize.
The Community presented an installation created of found objects and archive pieces from the fashion brand KOCHÉ. The installation was on view day and night in an abandoned shop on rue de Republique, in central Marseille.
The multisite exhibition titled “Le Sud bébé !” featured John Armleder, Morgane Tschiembe, Medhi Meddacci, Yann Gerstberger, Lucille Uhlrich, Diego Bianchi, Jeff Gibbons & Gregory Ruppe, Morgane, and The Community.
Creative lead in the creation of the brand website and online store by The Think Tank.
Koché is a fashion brand established in Paris by Christelle Kocher in 2015. The brand shows its collections at Paris Fashion Week and has also organized shows in New York, Tokyo, Milan, and Marseille. Koché regularly collaborates with major international brands such as Nike, Puma, Pucci, and Converse.
Set design for Miu Miu online campaign.
Photographer: Osma Harvilahti.
A creation and strategy bureau for international brands (2027-2020).
The Think Tank was born out of The Community, a Paris-based multidisciplinary art center founded by a collective of arts professionals from different disciplines.
The new-generation bureau functions as an international network offering advisory and implementation services with an artistic and cultural sensibility to organizations in the arts, fashion, luxury, and creative fields.
Arts and artistic integrity in its core; The Think Tank specializes in creating relationships and projects between the art world, cultural fields, and other industries.
Co-founder & Director of Art at The Community, a new-generation art centre with independent exhibition and event programming (2016-2020)
Side Projects
Solar Walkman is a series of collaborative zines dealing with different aspects of production and consumption. For each number, a different photographer is invited to react within the limits of two disposable cameras, and a predetermined location and timeframe.
The first edition titled “IKEA” was produced together with photographer Osma Harvilahti.
Edition of 36 copies (equal to the number of frames in a film roll).
Design of four stamps for the French Post Office.
A surf magazine produced together with Jussi Kantonen.
Exhibitions
May 14th combines techniques that are used in hypnosis, mediation, and memorization to induce a trance state in the audience. The goal of the performative piece is to take the participants on a contemplative and empowering journey into their unconsciousness and frame it in a way so that the unconscious suggestions can manifest in positive social and ecologic actions in the real world.
On the invitation of Mark Geffriaud.
HAVE/NEED Forum is an annual, independent, multi-disciplinary event that hosts a series of exchanges between designers, thinkers, makers and artists. The event creates a physical meeting point to collectively learn, share ideas, and construct alternative narratives through the extended practices of art, design, research, and philosophy. HAVE/NEED Forum was constructed in four threads, each of them presenting a new topic of conversation.
The 2023 edition featured Emanuele Coccia, Ruby Hoette, l’Idiot Utile magazine, Gabriel Figueiredo, Flora Bouteille with the Ethics Angels Company, and River Yarra.
For "My Instagram Persona", Nikkanen went through the data that the social network platform Instagram had saved on him and discovered a consumer persona made up of hundreds of different classifications. This list turned into an installation that visualizes the profile that Instagram’s artificial intelligence has created on Nikkanen.
Shown as part of the Intimacy exhibition at Design Museum Helsinki.
Curated by Annamari Vänskä.
What’s your long-term goal in life? is conceived as an architectural installation that secludes the main exhibition space from the rest of the building. The piece acts as a passage both in the physical and mental sense: it directs and restricts the entry to the space. It is a gesture that attempts to build a bridge between the artist's inner world and the collective subconscious.
With Dora García, Cally Spooner, Pierre Bal-Blanc, Nora Sternfeld, Virginie Bobin, Flora Bouteille, Vir Andrés Hera, Myriam Lefkowitz, and Aapo Nikkanen.
Curated by Bureau d’Études en Perfomances.
Some believe that the origin of our being is a union with a gentle emptiness. A mindless and effortless slide, into a place where the inner and outer worlds meet. Yet we find ourselves trying to maintain balance on a chaotic patchwork of infinite objects and desires, trying not to fall into one of the gaps in between. We focus to forget, not to remember, in a primal effort to maintain a sense of the world. In this reality, goosebumps come wrapped in cellophane and people swipe their fingers all over your face.
Duo exhibition with Pepo Salazar.
Joy of Living, Fear of Dying is the first of a series of works that deal with the notions of intimacy and empathy through fundamental psychological questions. “Fundamental” has in the last week started to drag a heavy weight with it, and maybe it's a good moment to focus on things that are less aestheticized, less trying to inspire us to always "become", and more concerned about what we already are.
The exhibition coincided with Russia’s attack on Ukraine.
Curated by Kaspars Grosevs.
For his exhibition in Open, Nikkanen not only portrays the feelings of dissociation from society and nature, but also looks for alternatives. A used garment can become material for a wearable artwork, and a severed arm turned into a candle holder becomes something not only somber, but can also symbolize for a new start.
Speaking
Writing
Think piece about the future of creative direction in the Web3 and Crypto industries.
1st and 2nd editions published in 2019.
>be me - a collection of greentexts is a curious collection of short stories from the biggest outsider website in the world. The book gives an exceptional insight into a young man’s psyche thanks to the veil of anonymity and the anarchic nature of 4chan. It is an unfiltered collection of all the things that make life so profoundly hilarious, heartbreaking and obnoxious, written in an oddly poetic language conceived by the 27 million monthly users of 4chan.org.
Shortly after being released, >be me - a collection of greentexts reached first place in the top 100 listings of its Amazon category, and it has been a subject of notable attention and cult following since. Several articles have been written about the project and it continues to be presented in different forms in exhibitions and events at regular intervals. Among others, it has been featured in Dis Magazine, Art Papers, oFluxo, the International Film Festival of Rotterdam and the Libros Mutantes Art Book Fair in Madrid.
Awards
Work Experience
What do we have - What do we need? addresses the environmental problems in the fashion industry and the culture of fashion through a multidisciplinary practice that includes workshops, artworks, publications, and communal events. The project proposes both a symbolic and physical forum that offers a space for critical thinking, sharing knowledge and hosting collaborations.
We collaborate with institutions, universities, and companies to discover novel, critical ideas and approaches in the expanded fields of design, fashion, art, and research.
What do we have - What do we need? has been supported by The Finnish Academic and Cultural Institute's network and 3537.
Lecturer in various Art and Design Universities, including École Duperré, École nationale supérieure des Arts Décoratifs, Riga Art Academy, and Institut Français de la Mode.
Writer of the "Notes from MajaMaja" newsletter.
A creation and strategy bureau for international brands.
The Think Tank was born out of The Community, a Paris-based multidisciplinary art centre founded by a collective of arts professionals from different disciplines.
The new-generation bureau functions as an international network offering advisory and implementation services with an artistic and cultural sensibility to organizations in the arts, fashion, luxury, and creative fields.
Arts and artistic integrity in its core; The Think Tank specializes in creating relationships and projects between the art world, cultural fields, and other industries.
The Community is a new-generation art centre with independent exhibition and event programming. I was the co-founder, creative lead, and director of art and installations from 2016 to 2020. During this time we worked with over 150 artists and designers, and created The Community: Think Tank, a creation and strategy bureau for international brands.