Lena Willikens and Vladimir Ivkovic have known each other for over 15 years sparking up a friendship at Düsseldorf's Salon Des Amaterus and by now having played countless times together, which is clear in their instinctive sets as they constantly nudge each other in unexpected ways. Sharing a mutual curiosity and a knack for out-there sounds, they're joint sets are a thing to behold.

Soundcloud (Willikens) / Soundcloud (Ivkovic)
Instagram (Willikens) / Instagram (Ivkovic)

1/4 of the mind and body behind outings such as Post Bar and Solstice Festival.

Soundcloud

Just before the second coming of breakbeat and tech house started to reeaeaally surface, D. Tiffany had been doing it better than most. Listening to her productions one can’t help but feel a jolt across one’s spine. Often with a tribal flair, her productions and DJ sets are laced with a sense of “hey, we’re here to have fun aren’t we?”

She’s the founder of the exquisite dance music label Planet Euphorique and the co-founder of the more experimental leaning xpq? in addition to being part of Plush Management Inc. and Ambien Baby, the first being a duo by her and Regularfantasy and the latter by her and Nap.

Soundcloud / Planet Euphorique

Do you promise to funk? The whole funk, nothing but the funk? Raphaël Top-Secret definitely does. The Parisian has kept a steady (and rising) following of people who love to get down and boogie as well as musical conoisseurs looking for the next secret beat, with performances at top clubs and festivals around Europe (& the world).

“It’s a better than good time”

Soundcloud / Instagram

DJ Aleksi is... you guessed it, a DJ (more accurately an all around one with the ability to cater to any occasion) but he's also a radio host and 1/2 of the people behind SMOOD, a duo who's been involved in the Helsinki dance music scene for many years now with club nights and cassette releases.

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No gimmicks, no bullshit. Katerina’s love for her music is as pure as a mother’s affection for her child. A highly sensitive artist willing to go the extra mile.

As her musical range covers everything from Prince to Drexciya and Legowelt, Manuel Göttsching to Steve Reich and Gil-Scott Heron, it’s pointless to make any assumptions. What you can be sure about is that whatever comes out of the speakers, it’s delivered with 100% love and dedication from a lifelong music enthusiast. Over and out.

Soundcloud / Instagram

Hanna Ojanen cut her teeth while living in Japan, undoubtedly scouring the bins of local record shops. Her immaculate taste in disco, house and funk is becoming better known to the general public weekend after weekend as she regurlarly plays at Helsinki's distintictive dance venues Post Bar, Kaiku and Siltanen.

Soundcloud / Instagram

Producer, DJ, singer and designer. Maria Korkeila aka emkay is a wizard in her fields, whether it’s stiching together sounds or fabric. Her usually up-beat and fun-loving releases on labels such as Post Sonics, Super Utu, and Radiant Love have caught the attention of the international ears over the past few years. And with a record pipelined for Scotland’s renowned Craigie Knowes, who know(e)s what tomorrow brings, aye.

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Breakbeat, dreamy House, UK Garage, Electro, you name it. This rave generator has got it all. The only thing you can be certain of is that the dial will be set to 'ELEVATE' and it’ll be gooooood, okay?

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Since popping up on the global radar a few years ago, Lauren Hansom has been a top favorite at the HQ. From spaced out downtempo excursions to curiously tip toeing on different verges of house music et al., her needle runs through a thread that’s primal, seductive and fun-drenched.

Hansom launched out of Australia with appearances and shows on a multitude of respected radio stations while also being part of the team behind Condesa Electronics, a highly-esteemed audio equipment manufacturer. She’s played all the favorite festivals and clubs by now from Dekmantel’s Lente Kabinet to Düsseldorf’s Salon des Amateurs, keeping her finger on the pulse without relying on surface level hype.

Lauren's dreamy yet bouncy dance affair will be peerrrrfect for a Midsummer shakedown on higher ground.

Soundcloud / Instagram

1/4 of the mind and body behind outings such as Post Bar and Solstice Festival.

Soundcloud

Coming in strong with sounds destined to stimulate your pineal gland. Regardless of her relatively new status as a person behind the 1s and 2s, Carlina has convinced audiences (and us) that she’s a force to reckon with. Exquisite taste in euphoric breakbeat and house music that flirts with the subtleties of trance (never going overboard). Yum-E.

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Solstice 2022 will be the first ever to witness Spekki Snake, or Snekki for short. That means Mama Snake and Spekki Webu join forces for an end of the world joint operation *sweat dripping down back*

Copenhagen’s trance-god Mama Snake has by now convinced people that there's no need to degrade your musical integrity to play trance. The Snake does it in a way that doesn’t over-emphazise the cheese, rather it melts together all the pieces of the pie to make a delicious and healthy meal regardless of your metabolism. While dutch shaman Spekki Webu takes techno into spheres beyond imagination. Crazy doesn’t even begin to describe it. Picture sword fighting at the core of the ultaworld. This would be the superfood of music. Bomba.

Soundcloud / Soundcloud

1/4 of the mind and body behind outings such as Post Bar and Solstice Festival.

Soundcloud

JENIFA has a keen ear for low swung worldly rhythms and soulful sonics from the southern continents of the seven seas.

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"I try to focus on providing the ‘background music’ for people who want to have their own crazy time".

A few years back Powder used to work for an electronics company in the Shinjuku district of Tokyo, all the while producing lush and primal, dreamy yet powerful house music for labels such as ESP Institute, Born Free Records Beats In Space and CockTail d'Amore. Today however her mesmerizing dj sets, a string of high quality releases and her own label Thinner Groove have gotten this Tokyo phenomenon out of the office and next to the dancefloor. And the world is better for it.

It’s difficult to pin point what makes Powder so special, the rich melodies, the intricate rhythms, the aloof playfulness? One thing's for sure though: Powder doesn’t demand your attention, she deserves it.

Soundcloud / Bandcamp

Whether it's that Chicago-leaning four to the floor stomp, hidden afro Discogs finds or dirty disco, DJ Jese brings the sunshine in with him wherever he goes.

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One could perhaps describe Roza Terenzi as a child prodigy. She produced her first ever track as a nine-year-old. And it’s actually pretty dope.

Anyway, fast forward to 2022 and Terenzi has played all the places that say “you made it”, from Berghain to Dekmantel, Primavera to London's Fabric. All this has come from working tirelessly at her craft: between 2018 and 2021, she released seven solo EPs and an album. And somewhere in there she found the time and energy to start her own label Step Ball Chain. The kind of work ethic you want from an artist, right?

We're very much excited to welcome the contemporary breakbeat wiz from down under who's immersive musical selection is sure to set you on a collision course with the Sun. Can you stand the heat?

Soundcloud / Instagram

Laura MRLS is the co-founder of event and podcast series SYNAĒ and a resident at techno multi-platform Monument. As a proponent of darker sounds, Laura finds comfort through layered sonic fabrics, adding into what is in the best of cases a mystic sensory experience. Add a nordic fell milieu into that mix and you might just think there was something stronger in that water of yours. Send. Off.

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The groovemaster. The Techno Interests me -guy. The label boss of Avoidance. Antti Salonen wears quite a few hats and that has certainly helped him get the recognition he deserves and has earned. You need to hear him play to get a sense though. There’s no use in explaining it. Those who know, know. And those who don’t, will.

Soundcloud / Instagram

PLO Man, representative of ACTING PRESS: an independent publishing project focused on the creation of self-produced, designed and distributed works.
Since 2015, ACTING PRESS has been carefully and consistently active in a globalized, underground music world.
https://youtu.be/KW_8E-3Kvew.

Soundcloud / Facebook

With more miles in the game than most, Cool DJ Pinball still manages to surprise everytime. You might know his work through long-running label Top Billin' and the hottest contempary imprint out there, Skorpioni. An influencer way before such a term existed. Live long and prosper, mr. Pinball.

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Miran Miran. mad miran. Left turns and right decisions is how we’d like to describe her sets. Bass… in your face? Perhaps but more than that in your mind…. and body. The past four years have trajected her onto global consciousness, bringing an undeniable energy with her wherever she goes. More could be said but you’ll just have to trust us on this, okay?

Soundcloud / Instagram

Juhani Oivo has been deejaying since the early 2000s and is an influential figure in the dance music scene of his hometown Oulu. With a wide range of musical influences from techno to dub to house and beyond, you can definitely hear a love for low end frequencies and percusso deliciosso.

He runs the Oulu-based club night Elektorni, which has been going strong for over 10 years and has in that time gained a cult following with its fresh and loose approach to playing house and techno. On top of that Oivo is involved in organizing dub music nights, underground raves and conceptual events that explore the more experimental side of dance music coming from places like Bristol.

Oivo's passion is furthering the local scene and in his 20-years of promoting he’s done hundreds of club nights and brought international artists like Mala, Central, Bjorn Torske, DJ Haus, Mungo's Hi-fi and countless more to perform in Oulu.

For Solstice Oivo will pack his record bag full of spellbinding techno music with immersive soundscapes fit for the fells and captivating rhythms to keep…that...damn…body...moving.

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A tour de force of back-to-backs.

The Mutual Intentions head honcho has in the recent years popped up on the flyers for more and more clubs around Europe, as well as being on his own tours in both Japan and Australia. From previously being associated a lot with soulful and jazz-influenced deep house and disco, his fetish for obscurities like what he calls ‘stock sound house’ have lately dragged him down in a balearic spaghetti of amateur and private press club music. ‘Soulful and energetic electronic music with waaay too much edge to it’ is how he explains his most recent purchases.

Soundcloud / Instagram

1/4 of the mind and body behind outings such as Post Bar and Solstice Festival.

Soundcloud

Avoiding Ben UFO’s name has been nearly impossible in the past 12 years with the Hessle Audio co-founder hitting every good spot around the globe.

From the UK pirate radio sound circling around 2-step, dubstep, jungle, and the style that spawned from those, the loosely defined UK Funky, Ben’s repertoire has always combined his early influences with the more worldwide house and techno sounds, arguably contributing to his success beyond the Queen’s land.

During the past decade Ben has shaped up to be a dance music chameleon, feeling at home on big stages as well as small intimate spaces.

Is it ok to use the phrase “deejay’s deejay” again?

Soundcloud / Instagram

Of groups INTe*ra, Globex, Kinetic Electronix, Music People, and Aquarian Foundation.

Soundcloud

Having grown up in the deep dark north Kristoffer Ala-Ketola has anchored his visual art practice in the dark milieu of uncertain forms of existence. Interest in the formation of identities melts into the genre of portraiture and gives way to a stew of new and unknown characters, and Ala-Ketola marks these personas with the grotesque, camp, queerness, and absurdist humor to fixate on the liminal edges between the fantastical and human. 

Kristoffer Ala-Ketola is a multidisciplinary artist from Oulu, Finland who graduated from Yale School of Art with a Master of Fine Arts in 2019. His works have been previously exhibited in 4th Ward Project Space in Chicago, Shin Gallery in New York, and Kunsthalle Helsinki, and he has also participated in video screenings at the Helsinki International Film Festival and Video Art Festival Turku. Ala-Ketola’s work engages in recurring themes of human emotion, crisis, and dreaming.

Hanna Valle is an artist and designer working with sculpture, drawing and online platforms. Creating visceral material formations and visual experiments, with a focus on science fiction, environment, labour and fragility, Valle gives shape to strange yet sensual narratives that attract the observer’s touch.

Through her curious sculptural formations, she seeks visual paths to imagine how the future landscape could seem — and what kind of different interspecies relationships and connections crawl on it. The sculptures speak in the language of organic matter and forms of life that rise from the all but nonviable ground. Through the movements of these creatures it is possible to sense a world of uncertain transformations — recognizable as dark images lurking in our unconsciousness — but also as glimmering, dreamy flickers for something else that is yet to come." 

Derived from the idea of recursion and hybridization, Fabian Bergmark Näsman (b. 1991, SE) has developed a unique artistic process where he casts sculptures from one mold to create an original piece each time through dissection and reconstruction. The results are abstract, and have thus been seen as an exploration of formal and academic queries. Bergmark Näsman’s sculptures oscillate between the natural and unnatural, raising questions of perception based on context.

Fabian Bergmark Näsman is educated at Gerrit Rietveld Academie in Amsterdam and Konstfack in Stockholm. He has participated in exhibitions internationally and recently realized his first public sculpture in Stockholm.

Text: Lauren Johnson

Photo: Emanuel Batali 

Currently investigating the notion of translation, my work stems from encounters with found objects. It is a process of creating a relationship, and through developing a shared language, I want to question the division between the human and the non-human. I see myself as a curator, a translator of this process where the length of my little finger weighs as much (if not more) as any universally agreed unit of measurement. 

Eliisa Loukola is a finnish artist based in Utrecht, NL. 

Tuva Björk is a Finnish artist and filmmaker based in Stockholm. Her practice springs from a desire to expand the boundaries of our empathy, and to interfere 

with the fictionalisation and simplification of our shared reality. Her previous work includes ‘Zoomania’, ‘We are a crowd of others’ and ‘Zamazama’.

She holds a BFA in Fine Arts and an MFA in Film Directing, both from Valand Academy of Art. She has also studied at the Department of Film and TV in the University of the Witwatersrand and has been an artist-in-residence at Bag Factory Gallery in Johannesburg.

Tuva is currently directing two feature length hybrid films: ‘Laws of the Wild’ and ‘in the bloom of dying amber’.

Photo: George Hooker

Helsinki based artist and designer Santeri Mortti Valtanen (b. 1993) mainly works with wood and textiles. Since graduating (Master of Arts, Aalto University, 2021) Valtanen has collaborated with textile and fashion brands besides working on sculptures for exhibitions. 

Discovering erratic boulders, playing basketball and marvelling at wild animals is what keeps the artist on track.

Timo Vaittinen is a visual artist living and working in Helsinki. Vaittinen works in numerous different techniques and materials including painting, sculpture, sound, fabric, video and artists' books. His art is tinged with a mystery that is firmly anchored in psychedelia and in underground cultures, and ranges from a documentarian style take rooted in reality, to dissolution into an imaginative, fictional narrative. Experimentation, material possibilities, reflections of notions on our present time, and the balance between the poetic and conceptual are at the core of Vaittinen’s practice.

He is a founding member of the artist-run exhibition space SIC in Helsinki, and artist-run publishing initiative Rooftop Press.

Timo was selected was selected in collaboration with Kuusmamo ARK for our arctic art residency.

Initiated by Pierre Dagba, Jules Gorget and Felix Ward, Matière Noire is a multidisciplinary studio exploring multiple spatial fields.

Matière Noire wants to be free of any sectoral partitioning. It is the meeting of architecture, light design and scenography that feeds their methodology and thus allows them to approach different project scales. Matière Noires practice combines an intuitive vision of space with a sensitive use of current technological tools.

Marianne Kurki is a visual artist, graphic designer and DJ living and working in Helsinki, Finland. She’s been studying in Lahti Institute of Design and The Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw.

Kurki is very open-minded and enjoys crossing the boundaries in the fields of visual arts.

She tends to express her feelings with colors and forms, and question her own values and choices through humor.

Spend a memorable nightless night and meet the king of the forest in close distance.

More information and booking here.

Ruka is home to some of the most beautiful nature Finland has to offer, making it a hiker's paradise. From whitewater rivers to Lappish fells and dense natural forests. Pack some grub and head out to the relaxing woods and stunning hills of the north.

More information about hiking trails you can do on your own and booking for guided hikes here.

Ruka-Kuusamo’s pure nature and the diverse repertoire of trails make the biking conditions invincible. Some trails require technical expertise, some are suitable for beginners.

Just jump on a bike and let it roll!

More information here.

Kuusamo and its roaring rivers are perfect for river rafting. From easier shorter routes to difficult and long ones.

More information and booking here.

Need for speed? Ruka's summer sled track takes you down the hill at up to 60km/h.

More information and booking here.

A relaxing way to explore the waters around Ruka.

More information and booking here.

Glide through the skies, over the Ruka fell with Finland's longest zipline as you marvel at the breathtaking scenery around and beneath you. Starting at Ruka’s peak, you slide to the crest at the Gondola Lift Station.

More information here.

Up with a lift, down by bike. Ruka-Kuusamo offers mountain biking in stunning landscapes for beginners and pros with ready made courses. Bikes are available to rent from Ruka Bikes.

More information here.

The natural environs of Kuusamo provide a highly fascinating locale for birdwatchers. A keen bird observer can spot Eastern species, more likely to be seen in Kuusamo than anywhere else in Europe. Some of these birds can only be spotted in Kuusamo. For some Northern species, Kuusamo is their southernmost area of occurrence.

More information and booking here.

Play disc golf on the scenic 21 or 9 lane courses. Play for free if you have your own discs or rent a kit from Ruka Village.

More information here.

Two excellent rivers for trout fishing, the Oulankajoki and Kitkajoki rivers, run through the Oulanka National Park. Surrounded by wild canyons and virgin forests, fishing in the park offers a truly unique and enjoyable experience for both novice and expert anglers. The park is also home to two of the most famous rapids in the country: Kiutaköngäs and Jyrävä.

Kuusinkijoki River is a little south of the National Park, but also an excellent river for trout fishing. Whichever spot you choose, we are sure you will return refreshed and exhilarated.

More information and booking here.