Elina Vainio’s The rights of things interrogates Western economic systems to dismantle historical and contemporary claims to own, build on and trade land. Drawing on the complex relationships between human action and the natural world, Vainio underscores the unsteadiness of materials and conditions that are otherwise considered stable and permanent. Ultimately, an experiment in forms and ideas, The rights of things is a proposition towards a new way of thinking about the state of nature and the environmental cost of endlessly building on and digging under the earth. 

Elina Vainio is a Finnish artist who works across different media including sculpture, drawing and video.  In her practice, she explores constructions of contemporary materiality from various perspectives in an attempt to unearth circumstances, influences and contingencies that shape cultures today.