Mika Taanila’s artistic production extends broadly through the fields of visual art, documentary filmmaking, and music video. After studying cultural anthropology at Helsinki University and graduating from the Institute of Design at Lahti Polytechnic in 1992, Taanila has worked as an editor, producer, screenwriter, director, and video teacher. He currently instructs in video at the Academy of Fine Arts in Helsinki, and has shown his work at video and film festivals both in Finland and abroad. His work Birdy placed fifth in MTV Europe’s music video competition, and his documentary Futuro – A New Stance for Tomorrow (1998) won the first prize in the national competition at the Tampere Film Festival in 1999. The core of his documentary work extends Futuro into the ‘Science & Progress’ trilogy, with Thank You for the Music (1998), and Robocup 99 (1999). As a whole, this series investigates the increasingly inter-reliant relationships between technology and society.
- Robin McCullough
Interview with Mika Taanila
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