EN / FI
I write to give form to observations that emerge from making artworks and from a sustained practice of listening. Some are difficult to put into words. Through concrete examples from my works, I seek a language in which these observations can be thought through, shared and preserved. Writing gives my artistic practice a body: experiences, decisions and questions take a form that can be returned to.
These books bring together photographs, essays and notes from making. They offer a way to return to an installation after it has ended, or to approach a work you could not visit. All publications are freely available as PDFs.
For a visual introduction to a particular work, start with the artist books below. For the method, begin with Volume I; for the decisions and responsibilities of making, read Volume II. Each can be read on its own.
Books on practice
Spatial Listening Architectures I
Writings on practice, 2008–2026 · 2026 · Finnish and English
How do you build a place for listening? Essays on listening to a site, arranging voices across a room, balancing intensity and silence, and leaving visitors free to find their own distance. Working notes from RE-BIRTH and Jurmo connect the method to particular choices.
Read Volume I in English (PDF)
Read Volume I in Finnish (PDF)
Spatial Listening Architectures II
The Weight of the Speaker · 2026 · Finnish and English
A closer account of making: casting concrete speakers, recording people together, choosing what remains audible, and building a work that must function after the artist has left. Jurmo anchors a book about material, doubt, the listener’s privacy and responsibility for other people’s voices.
Read Volume II in English (PDF)
Read Volume II in Finnish (PDF)
Artist books
INTER, Jurmo
The Sea Listens in Us / Meri kuuntelee meissä · 2026 · Finnish, Swedish and English
A photographic and written journey from the winter island to a listening bench facing the sea. Community conversations, the chapel’s pump organ, concrete speakers and changing weather trace how the work took shape. Swedish and English translations are gathered at the end.
Read The Sea Listens in Us (PDF)
View the installation
Field notes, March 2026
Photographs and brief observations from a stage when I was making sense of the Jurmo experience and the relationship between place, device and listener. These notes trace the development of the practice. They hold early formulations of ideas explored more fully in Spatial Listening Architectures. 15 pages.
Read field notes in English (PDF)
Read field notes in Finnish (PDF)
INTER, HELD
A room for what remains hidden · 2026 · English, with Finnish hymn text
Photographs and short texts follow a listening room built around a choir, saxophone, baritone and harmonium drone. The book approaches breath, fatigue, shared singing and the moving shadow image on the floor. Published under the work’s original title, SALATTU.
Read the INTER, HELD artist book (SALATTU, PDF)
View the installation
Earlier writing
Sound Without a Ready-Made Meaning
2013 · Revised edition 2026 · Finnish and English
My MA thesis on presence, Jerzy Grotowski and the inner work of sound design. It offers the theatre background to questions that later developed into spatial listening installations.
Read in English (PDF)
Read in Finnish (PDF)
Writing and interviews by others
Sara Oussaiden: You Can Touch the Water
Submersive Art, Hydrofeminist Phenomenology and Community Engagement · 2025 · English
Art and Philosophy BA (Hons) dissertation, Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art and Design, University of Dundee. Oussaiden examines her encounter with OWLA through embodied perception, hydrofeminism and participation. The work is a central starting point for her concept of Submersive Art.
Read the dissertation on Sara’s website
View OWLA
Finnish Cultural Foundation: Experiencing human sound
Interview · 2022 · English
An interview published by the Finnish Cultural Foundation on bringing people together, familiarity and strangeness, and the Narva residency. It offers background to the later listening installations through the artist’s own reflections.
For an overview of the artistic approach, see Practice. For exhibiting and commissioning a work, see For Curators.
