Interview with Alexandra Mitiku
We interviewed Alexandra Mitiku, whose performance for every home, a stone will take place at Parvisali on 28.–30.5.2026.
Kuva: Armando Tranquille
Mad House: “for every home, a stone " is a ritualistic poetry performance. What has inspired this performance and why do you feel ritual and poetry can speak to that?
Alexandra Mitiku: This performance consists of poetry that I have written and shared over the last four years in a semi-repetitive manner, each time with a new adjustment, a little more nuance. Poetic thought is revolutionary because, like a protest, it is disruptive and reparative; it speaks liberation into existence. A ritualistic approach also seeks transformation through repeated acts of intention. This will be the first semi-repetition to include stage design and movement.
In parallel, at the heart of every poem i share lies the movement of 한 / Han - a Korean cultural sentiment of a deep unresolved grief at systemic or personal injustice, and the hope for change. It is the weight of a feeling that is carried and passed on, evolving through generations.
By narrating through a relational perspective, the poetry challenges binary thinking, whether it is personal or political. Relationality allows for fragmented, seemingly unrelated matters to be tied together. We receive so much information these days and barely have reaction time, let alone response time. This time for contemplation is where we become part of the same story.
As 한병철 / Byung-Chul Han writes in his novel the disappearance of rituals, “Rituals are to time what a home is to space: they render time habitable..They are the opposite of acceleration. They create a dwelling, a staying. The disappearance of rituals leads to a loss..Everything becomes information, and information does not transform.”
MH: The title of the work“for every home, a stone "refers to the 돌탑/doltap, a Korean stone tower. What is its significance in your performance? How does the act of placing stones in prayer and remembrance connect to the themes of home, memory and algorithm?
AM: It can be considered that construction sites carry a universal language; scaffolding, barrier tape, drilling, hammering, helmets, machines clawing at the earth. And concrete.
Concrete structures are made with, but not exclusively, sand and crushed stones. They symbolize development, but also the destruction that comes with it. The stones in for every home, a stone were collected from a construction site in Hernesaari, near my old neighborhood. Reflecting on the correlation between economic development, climate crisis, patriarchy; displacement, gentrification, genocide, and migration; these stones serve as a material anchor.
By tying this material with the ritualistic form of 돌탑/doltap, the performance shifts the narrative and considers how we, as witnesses, are construction workers. How we participate in future-building matters; and whether we normalise extraction or symbiosis. The tension between the weight of the stones and the lightness of other elements reflects the relationship between physical realities and a poem that is also protest, prayer, confession, and requiem. Through this tension the poem also looks at how we fill emptiness and the influence of consumeristic thought.
MH: After the performance, the audience is invited to stay and interact with the installation. What kind of experience do you wish to create for the audience with the installation? How does it contribute to the overall discussion in your work regarding the relationship between physical materials and the concept of home?
The concept of home in my works is a response to my separation from it - whether it is my body, or a place, a person. I suppose this is inherent to diasporic thought.
The poems are a way to explore that gap and bridge these separations by moving through unresolved grief. Because these poems depict a continuance between personal memories, mythopoetics, current zeitgeist, and global histories, I hope it opens a space for dwelling; dwelling which is interchangeably the act of contemplation, or a house.
To connect with one’s own poetic thought disrupts the ways we imitate oppressive systems in our inner world, which is a step to changing how we shape our external world. The audience is invited onto the stage after the performance, embodying the idea that everyone in the room is part of this performance. Unity that is based on relationality, rather than sameness, has the ability to dissolve the barriers of binary hierarchies, identity politics, borders, and linear time.
