Projects

Ánnámáret

Ánnámáret, Sámi yoik
Ilkka Heinonen, Carelian bowed lyre jouhikko
Turkka Inkilä, electronics and shakuhachi
Marja Viitahuhta, video art
Ánnámáret is an indigenous Sámi yoiker with unique yoik voice and interpretation. With her band and visual artist she has created an audiovisual world. It combines Ánnámáret yoiks with the electronic music by Turkka Inkilä and Ilkka Heinonen's Carelian bowed lyre jouhikko sound, while Marja Viitahuhta's video art is in conversation with the music.
The entity draws on both the rich Sámi yoik tradition and the living culture, nature, and everyday life of Sápmi, transporting the viewer through images and music into intensely experimental worlds. These ingredients take on a resonant form in this time, embodying and concretizing the search for roots and the revival of tradition, addressing both its positive and more challenging aspects.
Ánnámáret working group will release their new album Bálvvosbáiki on 16th of August 2024. New video art has also been created to the yoiks of the new album. Yoiks in the entity reflect on how the Sámi worldview is found in this time. Are the old female gods Sáráhkka, Juhksáhkka and Uksáhkka still present? Is the power of the Sieidi, the sacred stone strengthened by yoiking it? What does the overgenerational grief feel like? The themes of the Bálvvosbáiki concert are familiar in Sámi culture, both historically and today.

Band

Ánnámáret, Anna Näkkäläjärvi-Länsman is a Sámi yoiker. She released her first yoik album Nieguid duovdagat with her band in February 2021. Before that Anna Näkkäläjärvi-Länsman has released two solo albums with Ánnámáret Ensemble (Beallječiŋat 2011 and Gollehelmmot 2016). She has operated as a solo artist in many Sámi music productions.

Ilkka Heinonen is a musician and composer, who specialises in folk music. His instruments include the Finnish bowed lyre, G-violone and the contrabass. In addition to bands that have gained influence from European folk music cultures, Heinonen has worked as both a solo artist and in an orchestra, in concerts and in projects of modern and traditional music.

Turkka Inkilä is a multi-genre musician and composer. Together with his band Tölöläb, he has aimed to create electroacoustic music that breaks away from scenic conventions. The music combines the unpredictability of modern music, the sincere pursue for beauty and the bodily experience of electronic dance music. He is currently studying the Japanese Kinko school’s shakuhachi programme at the lead of his teacher Gunnar Jinmei Linder, and he actively participates at the Helsinki-based Eloa ry association as a composer, arranger and flautist.

Marja Viitahuhta is a media artist whose works include short films, presentations, installations, photographs and collages. Her works have been exhibited internationally, for example at the Cannes Film Festival, where her film 99 Years of My Life was awarded in 2004. The said work has also been acquired for MoMA’s and Kiasma's collections. Many of Viitahuhta’s works involve immortality in relation to existence, review women’s’ biographical stories and experiences, and study the relation between text and images.