The Solstice art program commissions emerging artists to create site-specific works that respond to the landscape, light, and social context of the festival. The installations are developed on location, shaped by the environment and the temporary community that forms around the summer solstice.

Our annual open call welcomes proposals from emerging voices across disciplines, encouraging experimentation with form, material, and context. The selected artists are offered time and space to develop works that challenge perception and reflect the festival’s evolving curatorial theme.

Oulu is the European Capital of Culture for the year 2026 and Solstice is happy to be a part of the Oulu2026 cultural programme and cultural climate change.

Solstice Festival invites visual artists to contribute to reflect on shifting states of being during the stillness of midsummer. Held in a landscape where light stretches without interruption, the festival turns its attention this year to “Transformation”.

We are seeking works that consider how time moves: how it gathers, disperses, slows, or holds us in place. In a world where images surge past us, some remain—asking to be returned to, repeated, and carried forward. It is within this tension of motion and pause that we invite artistic responses.

Works may engage with these ideas in ways that feel intimate, expansive, or quietly reflective. Submissions are welcome from artists working in large scale art works. We especially welcome interactive visual mediums.

Please take in account in the submission the challenging terrain of the festival site. 

Eligibility

• Open to all artists, collectives, and creative units from Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Sweden, Norway and Denmark.

• Submissions accepted in Finnish and English.

Submission Requirements

• Proposals due by February 3th 2026, 11:59 pm EET.

• Email to [email protected] with a single PDF file (max 10 MB).

• A €1,000 stipend for selected artists.

• Travel costs, lodging and artwork transportation

• Material, installation and other basic costs covered from the production budget.

• 3-Day Festival Ticket

The selection will be made by a jury consisting of esteemed Finnish art figures, basing their decision on engagement, originality, interpretation of the theme, creative use of sustainable materials, and the installation’s feasibility within the environment of Rukatunturi.

We wish everyone applying to have an equal opportunity to be chosen. As a small festival, we cannot guarantee a budget to organize flights and artwork transport from countries further away than listed above. All nationalities are eligible to apply, yet the country of residence must be one of the mentioned.

For further inquiries, reach out to [email protected]