From Nature to Infrastructure: Vallisaari Island in the Helsinki Archipelago

Loading...
Thumbnail Image

Access rights

openAccess
publishedVersion

URL

Journal Title

Journal ISSN

Volume Title

A1 Alkuperäisartikkeli tieteellisessä aikakauslehdessä

Date

2020

Major/Subject

Mcode

Degree programme

Language

en

Pages

Series

Arcadia: Explorations in Environmental History, Volume Summer 2020, issue 28

Abstract

The history of Vallisaari is replete with natural and infrastructural entanglements. In between military occupations and abandonments, the island was transformed into an ecological paradise, but is now to be drawn back into the sphere of infrastructure through cultural and touristic development. Its transformations—whether for the worse or the better—have depended on regional geopolitics, location, and natural geography. When one traces this history, one finds an intermittent occupation of the environment by military structures, followed by abandonment, and subsequent recovery. Forthcoming international art events such as the Helsinki Biennial, inherently needing water, data, and energy to sustain them, also operationalize the island into infrastructure. Studying these natural and infrastructural transformations will be useful for any comprehensive study in the future to map the complex environmental history of Vallisaari.

Description

Keywords

infrastructure, environment, ecology, bio-diversity

Other note

Citation

Bhowmik, S 2020, ' From Nature to Infrastructure : Vallisaari Island in the Helsinki Archipelago ', Arcadia: Explorations in Environmental History, vol. Summer 2020, no. 28 . < http://www.environmentandsociety.org/node/9062. >