Index
00.
01.
02.
03.
04.
05.
06.
Information
What Should Finland Know About Nation Branding?
Loom of Reality
Concept Store: Consumer Culture as a Medium
Owen
Jäbät & Tunteet
Sexmane
 © Aarni Kapanen 2025
00.Aarni Kapanen is a designer working at the intersection of strategic design and critical art. His practice focuses on how systems of ownership, identity, and value are constructed—often through shared cultural and visual norms. With a specialization in place and nation branding, Kapanen draws from his research-led thesis on Finland’s state brand to explore how nations communicate identity, purpose, and soft power through design. His work spans from speculative concepts to real-world strategy, often blending media art, visual communication, and narrative tools.

Before beginning any design project, it’s essential to ask: Why does this matter—and how will it stand the test of time?

Awards
  • COMBINE24: Remix the Archive
    Main Prize & Audience Favourite (with Ilmo Kapanen)
    Finnish National Gallery, 2024
  • Vuoden Huiput – Silver Prize
    Grafia, 2020


Exhibitions
  • Body–Text–Space
    Luonnos Gallery, Helsinki
    23 February – 24 March 2024
  • Combine24: Remix the Archive
    Finnish National Gallery
    20 September – 26 November 2024, Teollisuuskatu 9, Helsinki
    9 May – 21 June 2025, Dunkunsthalle, 64 Fulton St, New York City
  • Concept Store – Consumer Culture as a Medium
    Luonnos, Uudenmaankatu 13, Helsinki
    15 August – 14 September 2025
  • Aalto ARTS Grad Show
    Väre, Aalto University Campus, Espoo
    3 September – 6 October 2025



aarnivk@gmail.com
Instagram
03.Concept Store: Consumer Culture as a Medium

Lorem Ipsum
Anglicus
2025 Group Exhibition

Concept Store is a group exhibition that explores consumer culture as both subject and material. It challenges the traditional role of the designer as a detached tastemaker and reframes design as a way to examine one’s own participation in consumption. What if the designer isn’t above it all—but deep within it?
    The exhibition blurs the line between gallery and commercial space, using mockups, products, images, and interfaces to interrogate themes of authenticity, criticality, and design’s complicity in shaping desire. My contribution combines speculative design and media art to investigate the aesthetics of consumerism and the emerging cultures of Web3.

Participating designers:
Aarni Kapanen 
Veera Kortelainen 
Akseli Manner 
Sanna Nykänen 

Poster design:
Akseli Manner
Poster for the Exhibition