SAARA PIRHONEN

1989 | Kitee | painting

I want my paintings to be like an attic full of wonderful but grimy treasures. I examine reality and its replicas through scenography and photography. I photograph my model and the spaces I construct, only to refigure them by painting distorted versions of my real perceptions.

I am fascinated by the world of theatre and photo studios as an alternative, fictional, space-within-a-space. I build up my paintings as if they, too, were stage sets. I interweave two-dimensional images to create warped replicas of three-dimensional spaces, yet the constituent parts are imperfectly joined, disconnected like stickers in a sticker book. The images in the narrative are partially hidden behind each other, concealing a secret story within the painting.

I have an utterly shameless attitude to beauty: I paint only those things that either enchant or disgust me. These filthy treasures make up a still life composition – they are both the stage set and the scene played within it.