Finnish photographer Sami Parkkinen’s Autopilot series, to be exhibited at the 2025 Atlanta Art Fair ( September 25th-28th ) offers a compelling meditation on the cultural, aesthetic, and environmental implications of the automobile.
Created in collaboration with environmental humanities researcher Frans Autio, treats the passenger car not merely as a vehicle but as a sculptural and symbolic object—one that occupies public space, reflects its surroundings, and conceals the environmental consequences of its manufacture and use.
Parkkinen’s images focus on surfaces: rusted metal, grime, condensation, and reflections—details that reveal the car’s interaction with the world while referencing broader themes of consumption, mobility, and ecological decay. One standout piece, depicting a dirt-covered Mercedes-Benz grille missing its iconic badge, subtly echoes Roland Barthes’ 1957 essay on the Citroën as a modern myth, interrogating how cars have been imbued with layers of meaning far beyond their function. The Autopilot series positions these familiar objects as silent witnesses to environmental degradation, their surfaces acting as visual archives of energy use, pollution, and human neglect.
By blending documentary photography with critical theory, Parkkinen elevates the visual language of decay into a poetic reflection on our collective dependence on technology and the silent price of progress. Presented in Atlanta as a solo installation, Autopilot marks Parkkinen’s U.S. debut and invites American audiences to confront their own relationship with the automobile—both as an icon of freedom and as a symptom of ecological crisis—making it a resonant contribution to contemporary environmental art discourse.