Nastja Säde Rönkkö

Below Zero is a UK-based contemporary art award for Finnish artists and artists residing in Finland who are emerging on the international art scene, organised by Beaconsfield Gallery, Serlachius and the Finnish Institute in the UK and Ireland, supported by the Mirisch & Lebenheim Charitable Foundation.

The award includes a mentored residency and exhibition at Beaconsfield Gallery in London, followed by a subsequent exhibition of the commission at Serlachius in Mänttä, Finland. The first Below Zero award residency took place in 2018.

Watch Nastja Säde Rönkkö’s interview on Serlachius channel. She talks about the themes of her video work and the work related to the Below Zero award at the Beaconsfield Gallery in London.

Nastja Säde Rönkkö is a Helsinki-based artist who works with media art, video, performance, installation and text. Her projects investigate relationships between the digital era, power, humanity and the future of our planet.

Rönkö’s international exhibition and performance venues have included:

• Somerset House, London
• Sydney Opera House SXSW, Austin, Texas
• Royal Academy of Arts, Lontoo
• Glasgow International; FACT Foundation for Art and Technology, Liverpool
• Museum of Moving Image, New York
• Kiasma Museum of Contemporary Art, Helsinki
• BMoCA Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art, Colorado
• Rønnebæksholm, Denmark

Her works have also been presented at festivals over the past year:

• Lago Film Festival, Italy (2023)
• Tampereen lyhytelokuvafestivaalit, Suomi (2023)
• Helsingin kansainväliset elokuvajuhlat (2017, 2021, 2022)
• Ivy Film Festival, Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island, USA (2018)

Her work has won several awards including Best Experimental Film at Hollywood Reel Independent Film Festival; Best Editing, NYC Indie Film Awards; Best Short Film and Best Director in Short Film, Marietta International Film Festival and Seeing the Bigger Picture Award, American Documentary Film Festival and Film Fund 2018. She was the 35th recipient of the Young Artist of the Year 2019 title and award in Finland, and the third recipient of the UK’s Below Zero Art Prize 2023.