Painting
1973, Soini
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The structures covered in snow show how human tenacity and a force of nature may alternate. During the day, the construction of the man-made structure proceeds, but at night the snow is allowed to cover it freely. Artificial light and natural light are also alternating in the same scene. Sometimes they are overlapping, adding yet more light into light. These kinds of layers are all around us. The idyll is behind the electrical cabinet.
Similar overlapping can be found in the way we experience memories. In the 1980s, the TV screen was filtered through a popcorn bowl. The white starch from the popped kernels imitated the shape of the mushroom cloud. The cloud was far away, somewhere where the popcorns came from, but it was simultaneously present in our living rooms. In those days, we imagined stories of Russian petrol stations, where Finnish tourists filled up their fuel tanks by exchanging the fuel for political nylon stockings. Aunt Hilja was sent a controlled parcel to the neighbouring country, which contained a predetermined amount of coffee accompanied by something light and proper, such as ornamental coffee serviettes. These are the layers with which I am doing silent construction and deconstruction work with paint.
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