sharing fruit and other
intimate encounters
(2023)


Sharing fruit and other intimate encounters is a photographic body of work investigating themes of intimacy, cohabitation and mundane meaningfulness. These are tied together by haptic, tactile materials and fruits especially take a center stage. In the arts fruits have traditionally symbolized love, romance and lust. Nivalainen is curious about these meanings, but also looks at fruits as ordinary, fleshly and decomposable bodies. They serve as metaphors for humanity, human relationships and human bodies, their materiality and the vulnerability. As such, the fruit also becomes a mirror for the artist themself: a way of investigating their own body and its (queer) feelings indirectly, hidden and in safety.

all content © 2021 veera nivalainen