Pictures

In my exhibition Systema Tinctura, at Galleria Huuto, process-like works are on display. The first step has been preparing the color pigments and the adhesives of natural materials.

For ‘Wine Black’, from the series ‘Spring’, I have prepared the black pigments from olive tree branches and grapevine from Tuscany. These shades of black, charred by the camp-fire, have been used for the grids of the work, too. The pigments in ‘The Meadow of Colors’, also from the series ‘Spring’, originate from the plants portrayed in the work itself. They can also be found as a straight formation on the top of the work. The series ‘Spring’ refers to the famous work by Sandro Botticelli by presenting, against its dusky background, plants of our time and their color tones. I don’t know which plants have disappeared from Tuscany since the early Renaissance. In my works, I wonder which plants and color pigments remain in the views we are used to.

In ‘The Eye of Beauty’, a video work, the petals of a flower change from yellow to shades of red which illustrates the process during which the red pigment is extracted.

I want to thank the Finnish Cultural Foundation, Varsinais-Suomi arts committee, and the Finnish Artists’ Studio Foundation for support.

The opening will be held Tuesday, April 29, at 6–8 pm. Welcome!

Additional info: Katja Syrjä, tel. +358 400 448 049
katjamarika@luukku.com

Pictures

It's time to get on with a real job. The one that does not pay the rent. The one you are never, even ironically, told to get. The one your family, friends or government would not be gently leading you towards. The one that matters.

For my fourth solo exhibition I thought I?d do something real. Plan was to go back some twenty years to when I started making these marks. Once there, to take a look around and make notes, to take a deep breath and absorb feelings, then get back to the present and just start anew. I was curious to see what crawls out of me the second time around. Maybe the approach would be to unlearn the educated part of art making in me and let the fun of just making things guide the process as it once did. Or maybe the approach would be to draw upon the so-called educated skills while quoting the imagery, energy and flavors of selected things from my youth. Or maybe to melt these into one or two or three points to be shuffled once or twice more. Or ? something.

So what did we get? An installation, a cluster of fragmented imagery, juxtaposed styles, cross-referencing paintings, drawings, photos etc. The works draw on a range of influences, as they have been made with a range of methods, to fulfill a range of intents.

A bunch of stuff about a bunch of stuff.

As the installation consists of nearly a hundred smaller parts it is easy to calculate what it approximately contains:

painting 18%
drawing 22%
photography 25%
digital vs. old-school cut, paste and glue 23%
minimalism 7%
abstraction 12%
graffiti 22%
nature 9%
animals 18%
urban existence 19%
notebooks 18%
subconscious 16%
documentation 19%
objects 3%

The opening will be held Tuesday, April 29, 2008, at 6-8 pm.
t: Sami Pennanen
040-7617904
sampen@welho.com
http://www.phinnweb.org/USO/m