Prof. Dr. Arto K. Haapala has been Professor of Aesthetics at the University of Helsinki since 1995. He received his PhD at the University of London. As a post-doc he was a Humboldt Fellow at the University of Bochum in 1992-1993. He has been a visiting Professor at several European universities (University of Lancaster, UK; University of Murcia, Spain; University of Palermo, Italy; University of Málaga, Spain; National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Greece), as well as in the United States (Temple University, Philadelphia).

Arto Haapala is the former President of the Finnish Society of Aesthetics and the Nordic Society of Aesthetics. He is the President of the board of the International Institute of Applied Aesthetics based in Lahti and in Helsinki, Finland. He has been a member of the Finnish Academy of Science and Letters since 2002 and has also served as the member of the board. He has acted in several positions in university administration at the University of Helsinki, as well as in other academic positions in Finland. He was awarded the honor of the Knight of the First Class by the Order of the White Rose of Finland in 2024.

Haapalas research topics include philosophy of literature, Martin Heidegger’s philosophy, environmental aesthetics, especially aesthetics of urban environments, and everyday aesthetics. Besides, he has written on various other issues related to philosophical aesthetics. He has authored and edited thirteen books and eighty articles. He is the co-founder and former co-editor-in-chief of the Journal of Aesthetics and Phenomenology (Routledge). His current research focuses on everyday urban aesthetics, taking inspiration from some of Heidegger’s concepts and ideas put forward in Sein und Zeit.

From 1 October to 31 December 2025 Arto Haapala works at the Centre for Advanced Study as an Alexander von Humboldt Stiftung alumnus.