Maria Huhmarniemi (She/her)

Maria Huhmarniemi, Doctor of Arts, serves as Vice-Dean for Education and Associate Professor at the Faculty of Art and Design, University of Lapland. Her work focuses on art and research that promote sustainability transformations. She develops Arctic art and art education and creates socially and ecologically engaged art that employs art-based methods to address societal challenges.

Huhmarniemi holds a title of docent at the University of Eastern Finland, the UArctic Chair in Arctic Art and Design, and the leader of the Arctic Sustainable Arts and Design network. She has She has published over 50 peer-reviewed research articles or chapters and has also served as an editor of academic publications.

Huhmarniemi has also held numerous positions of trust in the art world and in local politics. She resides part-time in Rovaniemi, Finland, and in Muodoslompolo, Pajala Municipality, in northern Sweden.

As an installation artist, Huhmarniemi has exhibited her works widely. Her solo exhibition was presented at the Aine Art Museum in Tornio in 2015, and her works have been shown at the Anchorage Museum in Alaska, Tate Liverpool, the Nordic House in Reykjavik, the Craft Museum of Finland, and the art museums of Oulu, Kemi, and Rovaniemi.

2025 – Observations of Change, group exhibition, Havermagasinet, Boden, Sweden
2025 – Snowball Effect 5 – Northern Gaze, juried exhibition, Kemi Art Museum, Kemi
2024 – Shifting Ground, juried exhibition, Rovaniemi Art Museum, Rovaniemi
2024 – Embroidered Stances, group exhibition, Craft Museum of Finland, Jyväskylä
2023 – Mäntän äärellä, invited artist in a curated group exhibition, Mänttä
2021 – ISEASgroup exhibition, Rovaniemi Art Museum, Rovaniemi
2021 – Counter Cartographies, invited artist in a curated group exhibition, Anchorage Museum, USA
2021 – Art Cave Saimaa Retretti, invited artist in a curated group exhibition, Retretti, Saimaa
2018 – Shared Woollen Sceneries, group exhibition, Tate Liverpool, UK
2017 – Interwovengroup exhibition, Nordic House, Reykjavik, IS

My research focuses on the processes through which individuals learn as members of communities and society. Using art-based action research approaches, I examine pedagogical or art-related community and participatory practices that support social development. The contexts of my research include communities experiencing environmental conflicts, creative learning in tourism, and art-based environmental education within informal learning settings. Through action research, I aim to initiate or support sustainability transformations.

My research is partly art-based and partly artistic in nature, in that the research processes involve pedagogical guidance of community members in artistic activities, the use of art-based data, and the interpretation of processes and phenomena as artistic productions. I conduct my research as part of the University of Lapland’s research and development projects and in collaboration with other researchers and artists. My work is future-oriented and includes pedagogical and artistic interventions aimed both at producing change and at observing and analyzing it. Dialogical approaches are characteristic of both my art and the research methods I employ, and most of my publications consist of group and community exhibitions as well as co-authored articles and chapters.

I began my teaching career at the University of Lapland in 2002. At that time, my teaching focused on community art workshops as well as snow and ice sculpting and ceramics. In these courses, I integrated project-based pedagogy with regional development in Northern Finland and research in art education. Since completing my doctoral degree in 2016, my teaching has focused on master’s level courses, supervision of master’s theses, and instruction in research methodologies.

I am living in working in Rovaniemi, Finland, during the academic year. Seasonally I live in Muodoslompolo, Northern Sweden.

maria.huhmarniemi (at) ulapland

00358 40 7639948