Annette Arlander is theatre director, Master of Arts (philosophy) and Doctor of Art (Theatre and drama). She was the first to be awarded a doctorate from the Theatre Academy in Helsinki (in 1999). In 2001 she was invited to be professor of performance art and theory at the Theatre Academy and started the MA degree program in performance art and theory (or Live Art and performance studies, as it is called today). In 2007-2009 she was also Head of the research department or Performing Arts Research Centre (Tutke) at the Theatre Academy www.teak.fi/annette_arlander
Arlander's art work is focused on performing landscape, i.e. by means of video or recorded voice. Her research interests include artistic research, performance as research, performance studies, site specificity, landscape, and the environment www.harakka.fi/arlander Some of her video works can be viewed online at www.av-arkki.fi/en/artists/annette-arlander_en/

Research publications (referee)
2009. Event scores for performing interruptions. In: Tiina Mäntymäki and Olli Mäkinen (eds.) Art and Resistance. Proceedings of the University of Vaasa. Research Papers 290, Vasa: University of Vasa, pp. 153-168.
2009. Huomioita hiekassa – maisema, esitys, liikkuva kuva ja liike kuvassa. [Notes in Sand – landscape, performance, moving image and moving in the image.] In: Laura Gröndahl, Teemu Paavolainen and Anna Thuring (eds.) Näkyvää ja näkymätöntä [Visible and Invisible], Näyttämö ja tutkimus 3, Helsinki: Teatterin Tutkimuksen seura, pp. 49-68.
2008. Finding your way through the woods – experiences in artistic research. Nordic Theatre Studies, no. 20, pp. 28-41.
2007. Miten maisema minua liikuttaa. [How the landscape moves me.] In: Olli Mäkinen and Tiina Mäntymäki (eds.) Taide ja liike [Art and Movement], Vaasan yliopiston julkaisuja Tutkimuksia 282, Vaasa: University of Vasa, pp. 143-181.
2006. Performing Landscape – Many Places, Many Patrons. In: Irene Eynat-Confino and Eva Sormova (eds.) Patronage, Spectacle and the Stage. Prague: Prague Theatre Institute, pp. 167-179.
2003. Performing Landscape – Acting Text, Nordic Theatre Studies, no. 15, pp. 60-76.

Other research publications
2010. Characteristics of Visual and Performing Arts. In: Michael Biggs and Henrik Karlsson (eds.) The Routledge Companion to Research in the Arts. London and New York: Routledge, pp. 315-332.
2010. Performing with Trees: Landscape and Artistic Research. In: John Freeman (ed.) Blood, Sweat & Theory – Research through practice in performance. Faringdon: Libri Publishing, pp. 158-176.
2010. Kohtaamispaikka, epäpaikka, vastapaikka ja performanssi. [Meeting place, non-place, counter-site, performance.] In: Lea Kantonen (ed.) Ankaraa ja myötätuntoista kuuntelua. [Listening with rigour and compassion]. Helsinki: Academy of Fine Art.
2009. Artistic Research - from Apartness to Umbrella Concept at the Theatre Academy, Finland. In: Shannon Rose Riley and Lynette Hunter (eds.) Mapping Landscapes for Performance as Research - Scholarly Acts and Creative Cartographies. London: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 77-83.
2007. Yksityisestä julkiseen. [From Private to Public.] In: Risto Pitkänen (ed.) Taiteilija tutkijana, tutkija taiteilijana. [The artist as researcher – the researcher as artist]. Nykykulttuurin tutkimuskeskuksen julkaisuja 90, Jyväskylän: University of Jyväskylän, pp. 131-158.
2003. Performing Landscape. In: Soile Veijola (ed.) Landscapes of Presence – Aesthetics, Amenities and technologies. Publications in the Social Sciences B47, Rovaniemi: University of Lapland, pp. 145-168.

Artistic research can be understood as a form of research in itself, different from, but possible to juxtapose with, other forms like philosophical, historical, ethnographic research etc. However, if we are not constantly focusing on the artworks (or artistic practice) and their role in the research project, then the specific knowledge embedded in artworks, artistic practices and the artists themselves is easily bypassed, colonized or assimilated into familiar forms of research. On the other hand, a dichotomy based on the idea of equivalence, which originally meant to strengthen the position of artistic work, can easily develop into an apartheid situation where artistic research has some privileges based on the traditional freedom of art, but no access to knowledge production in and of itself. Strict dichotomies between art and research, art and scholarship, art and science, or art and theory all lead to absurdities and tend to devalue embodied and tacit knowledge. Contemporary art is often involved in various forms of knowledge production. And it is not only the knowledge of artists that is embodied and situated. Or so it seems from a Helsinki perspective. (Arlander 2009, pp. 81-82)