Sibelius Academy sets up a new residency programme with Paloheimo foundation funding
The Leonora and Yrjö Paloheimo Foundation has awarded a grant of EUR 60,220 to Uniarts Helsinki’s Sibelius Academy for organising a residency programme named Third Spaces at Kallio-Kuninkala in the City of Järvenpää.
The Third Spaces project is a ten-day residency programme organised by the Sibelius Academy’s Global Music degree programme in 2026 and 2028. The artistic residencies bring together Indigenous and other artists from diverse cultural and artistic backgrounds, with the central aim of developing new forms of intercultural artistic collaboration. The Third Spaces project is led by Professor Nathan Riki Thomson of the Global Music degree programme.
“In 2026, the theme of this project has become increasingly important as our world faces further division, polarisation, and enormous societal and environmental challenges, calling for artists, educators, and researchers to continually re-evaluate and re-imagine their roles and responsibilities. We are extremely grateful to the Paloheimo Foundation for kindly supporting this work. Through the lens of artistic research, employing interwoven artistic and research actions, the Third Spaces project investigates the ways in which artists from diverse backgrounds work together and the potential societal relevance of the artistic and extra-artistic skills and qualities that are developed through this process.”, Thomson states.
The project is built around a series of biennial artistic residencies, which are planned to take place in Kallio-Kuninkala, Järvenpää, and Santa Fe, New Mexico. The first residency, held in Kallio-Kuninkala in October 2026, will bring together Indigenous Aboriginal, Māori, Native American, and Sámi artists, together with other artists, doctoral researchers, and students from diverse cultural backgrounds.
Projected outcomes from the project include the further development of applied pedagogical and artistic methods for ethical intercultural artistic collaboration, the production of new collaborative artistic work, and research publications.
The new knowledge generated from this project will feed back into the Global Music degree programme, which began as a pilot in 2010 and was later established as a full degree programme in 2020. The core focus of the programme is on the interweaving of research informed intercultural collaboration, community engagement, and diverse forms of artistic identity.
Furthermore, the newly launched residencies also aim to deepen our understanding of how the project’s core values and approaches to intercultural artistic collaboration may have wider relevance within music education and the broader society.”
Support from foundations enables intercultural cooperation across continents
The Third Spaces residency activities are part of the larger four-year Voice and Justice project, funded by the Erkko Foundation and implemented at the University of the Arts Helsinki. Overall, the Voice and Justice project explores the role of music, musical heritage and musical performance in enabling cultural understanding and dialogue. Over the course of the project, four international artistic collaborations, several teaching visits and a four-year research project will be carried out.
The Leonora and Yrjö Paloheimo Foundation and the US-based Paloheimo Foundation jointly support the Third Spaces residency programme, which will take place in 2026 and in 2028. The foundation supports the growth of young artists and arts education. It has a close collaboration with the University of the Arts at Kallio-Kuninkala, which serves as the university’s Järvenpää campus.
The foundation provides the Kallio-Kuninkala facilities for the university’s use and supports its activities. It also contributes to funding the Sibelius Academy’s international masterclasses and promotes cultural exchange between Finland and the United States through targeted grants. The foundation does not have a public application process for grants.
Further information
- Professor Nathan Riki Thomson (nathan.thomson@uniarts.fi)
- Leonora and Yrjö Paloheimo Foundation, Chair of the Board Lauri Paloheimo, lauri.paloheimo@kuninkala.fi, tel. 040 777 8990