17.09 & 19.09.2025

As part of Field_Notes – Living Methodologies, Bioart Society together with the Kilpisjärvi Biological Station will host two public events at the Kilpisjärvi Biological Station. Both events are open to anyone interested to join, and for the second one there is a possibility for online participation. Detailed information on both event below (also briefly in Finnish at the bottom of this page). Both events will be held in English.

Wednesday 17 September at 18:30-20:00

Learning Endings: Ecologies of Care in Arts-Sciences Collaborations
by Aleksija Neimanis and Astrida Neimanis
Kilpisjärvi Biological Station

Every year, hundreds of whales and other marine mammals strand on terrestrial shores. These ocean-dwelling animals are mostly hidden from humans during their lifetimes, but in a stranding death, they reveal themselves to us, and call on us to care. What might this care look like? What can these deaths teach us about the entangled futures of humans and oceans? Drawing on collaborative research between artist Patty Chang, cultural theorist Astrida Neimanis and veterinary pathologist Aleksija Neimanis, this conversation between Astrida and Aleksija explores the ways arts-sciences collaborations can change how scientists perceive and practice their work. It wonders: can art also care for science?

This talk takes place onsite at Kilpisjärvi Biological Station but will be audio recorded and available to access on the Bioart Society website at a later date.

Aleksija Neimanis is a veterinary pathologist and researcher who works with wildlife health and disease surveillance. She studies wildlife health issues, including emerging and re-emerging diseases. Aleksija frames wildlife health findings within a One Health context, in which human, animal and ecosystem health are all connected. Since 2020, Aleksija has been part of an arts-science collaboration Learning Endings together with Astrida Neimanis and artist Patty Chang. Currently, Aleksija leads the Research and Development Section in the Department of Pathology and Wildlife Diseases at the Swedish Veterinary Agency and is Associate Professor in Wildlife Health at the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences.

Astrida Neimanis is a practice-led cultural theorist working at the intersection of feminism and environmental change. Astrida’s international research practice includes collaborations with artists, writers, scientists, makers, educational institutions, and communities, often in the form of experimental public pedagogies. Her 2017 book, Bodies of Water: Posthuman Feminist Phenomenology, is a call for humans to examine our relationships to oceans, watersheds, and other aquatic life forms from the perspective of our own primarily watery bodies. Her forthcoming book, co-authored with longtime collaborator Jennifer Mae Haumilton, is called How to Weather Together: Feminist Practice for Climate Change (2026)—an accessible theoretical and practical guide to the redistribution of shelter and vulnerability, guided by anticolonial, antipolarizing and antifascist feminist commitments. Currently, Astrida is Associate Professor and Canada Research Chair in Feminist Environmental Humanities at UBC Okanagan, on stolen territories of the syilx Okanagan people in Kelowna, BC, where she is also Director of the FEELed Lab, established in 2021.

Friday 19 September at 18:30-20:00

SING Sábme – decolonizing science as a way of strengthening Sámi governance in settler colonial Europe
by May-Britt Öhman
Kilpisjärvi Biological Station & online

May-Britt Öhman’s presentation revolves around the practical work with decolonizing science and education, through training programs and research, and more concretely the SING Sábme.
The first ever SING (Summer Internship for Indigenous Peoples in Genomics) Sábme took place during August 10-16, 2025 in the lands of the Flakaberg group within Gällivare Forest Sámi village. SING Sábme is a collaboration between Uppsala University’s Centre for Multidisciplinary Studies on Racism (CEMFOR), the Faculty of Native Studies at the University of Alberta, the University of British Columbia’s Department of Forest and Conservation Sciences, and local Sámi community members and experts. SING Sábme builds on the SING Canada approach and has been developed to fit Sábme’s unique cultural, educational and political contexts. A key concern for local reindeer herders is the many intrusions and increasing destruction of reindeer lands, and thereby into a core of Sámi culture. A major concern at the moment is the planned establishment of wind power – which is supported with a hollow argument that it is supposedly “green”. This was therefore made into the main focus of the 2025 workshop.

The 2025 workshop provided hands-on, place-based education in Sámi cultural practices and practical and technical skill-building in environmental genomics approaches. It was supplemented by learning sessions that introduced a critical and ethical framework for considering Indigenous science and educational approaches.

The SING originated in the USA, and has grown into a global SING Consortium, including SING Canada, Aotearoa, Australia and Mexico. The concept of SING is an annual all-expenses-paid one-week intensive program designed to build Indigenous governance capacity and scientific knowledge. Indigenous participants–university students, academic and community fellows–are invited to engage in hands-on classroom, lab, and field training in genomic science, bioinformatics, Indigenous knowledges, and bioethics.

In her presentation, Öhman will talk about the work towards organising the SING Sábme 2025, some about what took place during the workshop, and some of our aspirations, hopes and ambitions for the future.

SING Sábme was to a large extent funded as an Indigenous-led place-based project within the larger global research program ⴰⵔⵔⴰⵎⴰⵜ Ărramăt: Strengthening Health And Wellbeing Through Indigenous-Led Conservation and Sustainable Relationships With Biodiversity, based at University of Alberta, funded by Government of Canada’s New Frontiers in Research Fund (NFRF), [NFRFT-2020-00188], along with funds of the Swedish research councils FORMAS and Vetenskapsrådet. Furthermore the participating scientists have to a large extent contributed with their own time, for preparation and research design.

May-Britt Öhman is associate professor in environmental history, researcher at the Centre for Multidisciplinary Studies on Racism, CEMFOR, Uppsala University, Sweden. Öhman is Lule and Forest Sámi of the Lule River valley, and has Tornedalian heritage. Öhman leads the research group Dálkke: Indigenous Climate Change Studies, funded by the Swedish National Research Program on Climate Change. Öhman worked extensively with the establishment and development of the research field Indigenous Climate Change Studies, centering Indigenous peoples’ expertise, experiences, perspectives and epistemologies, through publications, film making, organization of seminar and workshops, and network building.

To join online contact eliisa.suvanto[at]bioartsociety.fi to register. Deadline for registration is 18th September if you want to join online but you don’t have to register to join on-site at the Station.