Pictures

"Lovebirds" studies the human relationship, and themingling expectationsand disappointments within it.With the focus on everyday items, the worksdisplay the gender roles in transition withoutflinching humour oraggravation.The exhibition consists mainly of sculptures made withmixedtechniques. 

The fascinating thing about sculpture is the possibility to use alreadyexisting items that are intrinsically loaded with different kinds ofmental impressions Good examples are the cleaning equipment and the tools,which tend to be either feminine or masculine in our thoughts, aslogically as in German grammar(= extremely logically). 

For instance in "Toolbox" the tools have transformed into china and someof them are already broken into pieces, reflecting the regeneratingconcept of a man. The man witnesses that his traditional means andinstruments of power are falling apart. He is also,more and more, seen asa mere "toolbox", an object of the woman's emancipating sexuality andpower. 

And since we're talking about the two sexes we cannot bypass the discourseabout values. Hence, it is surely in place topoint out that the artist isneither a feminist nor a chauvinist, whichprobably leads to both of thecamps getting fuel for their fire from thisexhibition. That is good sincelife's not easy in either of the camps nowadays. Maybe that is equality.

Sanna Leppä studies sculpture in the Masterof Fine Arts -program at theAcademy of Fine Arts. Recently her works have been displayed at theArtists' Annual Exhibition in 2006(Artists' Association of Finland) andat the Purnu 2006 summer exhibition in Orivesi. "Lovebirds" is SannaLeppä's first private exhibition.

Contact: Sanna Leppä +358 45 6 555777 firstname.lastname(at)pp.inet.fi

Pictures

Present and absent 

Tuomo Rainio’s photographic images and video works

Digital photography expands the possibilities of photographic representation. In the exhibition Haave/a artist Tuomo Rainio uses still and moving digital images to create a vista of experiences of human existence and evanescence. Thus his work also moves towards and beyond the limits of traditional photographic representation.

The subject for Rainio’s photographs is the simultaneousness of presence and absence of human existance. In this exhibition he works on change happening between these states. The seen reality is reduced into a sequential continuum, which becomes visual through changes. The images and videos do not simply represent their subject matter. They also reveal the process of perception, of how images become consciousness. Tuomo Rainio manages to reveal a part of visual reality that is always present but rarely represented by photographic practices.

In his work, Rainio shifts from the traditional photographic logic of freezing time to characterizing the changes. People in the works are represented as present and absent at the same time. These photographs do not display reality on their visual basis but within the logic of their technique. The world of the exhibition is in a continuous process of changes: the presence flickers in motion, movement of a face draws the image, and human figures vanish when they stop.

Technically, all of these images are based on two photographs and their post-photographic double exposure. Images are generated by a simple algorithm, so that everything that is similar in two photographs is filtered out and only the difference is made visible. This same technique is used also for the video works. Image sequences are processed to visualize what is between the single images. Some of the works show only the changes, while others show the slow process of an image appearing from the accumulating changes.

The name of the exhibition is a double exposure of two words. At the same time the name indicates a technical method behind the images and creates a shift between two possible implications. Haava (wound) and Haave (dream or illusion) refer to two extremes, that direct one’s choices in life.

The exhibition is held at Gallery Huuto on 31.1. – 11.2.2007.  Some of the works are also displayed in the new permanent exhibition of the Finnish Museum of Photography starting from 9th of February.

Tuomo Rainio is studying photography in the MA programme in University of Art and Design Helsinki. He has already taken part in several group exhibitions in Finland and abroad. Haave/a is his first solo exhibition.

Exhibition: Tuomo Rainio, Haava/e, 31.1.-11.2.2007 Gallery Huuto, Uudenmaankatu 35, Helsinki

For further information, please contact:

BA, Tuomo Rainio, 050 3210 783, firstname.lastname(at)uiah.fi, www.rainio.pp.fi