Kristoffer Ala-Ketola (VAV - moving image)
Elf
Performance and video installation
'Elf' is an artwork by Kristoffer Ala-Ketola which combines performance, video, painting, and sculpture into an installation which plays with the idea of escaping the reality with using the thematics of cosplay.
Aspiration for being something more than human by dressing up creates a chance to embody multiple identities including an aspect of it not being real or permanent. It can be empowering or frustrating.
”Cosplay makes the ambiguous relation between the fictional and actual explicit.…Cosplay does not just fictionalize everyday life and give it an aesthetic dimension; it also shows how the fictional shapes the actual … Fans construct their own identity by associating themselves with fictional characters and embodying them. Cosplay emphasizes that the self not only narrates fiction but is partly fictional as well. It is through interaction with stories that we can imagine and perform ourselves.” Nicolle Lamerichs 'Stranger than fiction,' para. 6.2.
