My work is a set of 64 photographs presenting traffic signs pointing the route to Meri-Pori.
In the Pori-area, there are a vast number of signs indicating the way to Meri-Pori. First, I noticed the curiously rhythmical, poem-like pair of words, Meri-Pori, meriporimeriporimeriporimeripori in different places around central Pori. Later, the area itself become compelling. A group of distant neighborhoods that lived their own life separate from the center of the town. However, trying to figure out the whereabouts of Meri-Pori from the signs is confusing – they are pointing to all possible directions. When you finally find your way to Meri-Pori, you find out that it becomes fragmented. There is no Meri-Pori as such, just smaller neighborhoods, Pihlava, Yyteri, Mäntyluoto and finally, far away, separated by the sea, Reposaari.

Objective analysis concerning the location of Meri-Pori:

There are 64 standard blue-white signs showing the to Meri-Pori. Most of them are simple arrows pointing the direction and some just tell the distance to the destination, but the set includes also more complicated designs that instruct the correct way driving through a roundabout. Most signs are visible to the traffic, but some were hidden by dense vegetation.

According to the signs, the most secure method for finding the route is to turn right (37 signs), instead of left (15 signs), or continuing straight forward (12 signs). The data extracted from the close surroundings of the signs shows that Meri-Pori is most probably located somewhere between Mäntyluoto and Vaasa (22 and 19 mentions) rather than Helsinki or Turku (12 and 7 mentions). However, the data is not totally consistent, there is some evidence that Meri-Pori is located in the vicinity of Keskusta (city center), Ulasoori, Yyteri or Pori (8, 3, 2 and 2 mentions). While the analysis of the last segment of data is still in progress, some incongruity can be found at least on one occasion Meri-Pori seems to be located in an opposite direction from Pori. This calls for further fieldwork in order to ensure the correctness of the data.