Saturday, November 19, 2011
My Study 20 Years Ago
This meant the start of the final episode of my life. I turned sixty in 1991. I had finished my long career as a maker of TV films. I wanted to return to make paintings, which is where I had started as a young man. What would my themes be like? In the 60's I had drawn a picture of the Biafra War. I made it into a large painting. One could make endless descriptions of massacres such as this one, as new wars were breaking out all the time. What if I painted a series of Oulu, the town to which we had escaped the war from Vyborg. And that's what I did. Thus came into existence the 100 Pictures of Oulu. As the Internet was born at about the same time in the late 90's, I and my son Markus decided to put up an online exhibition of these works. I think it was one of the first online exhibitions of its kind in the world.
Identifiers: Study
Friday, Movember 18, 2011
Entire Picture of the Sky
Earth, water, air and fire were rational classic elements. Modern physics also knows four basic forces of nature: 1. Gravitation has an effect on all of us. With large solids, it grows so big that it almost defeats all other forces. 2. Electromagnetism underlies all chemistry and biology, and is an ever greater force than gravitation. 3. The weak nuclear force has a significant position in the origin of all elements, while 4. the strong nuclear force is the source of energy for the Sun and nuclear power, but we are not directly involved with it. (Fukushima?)
These basic facts and a lot of other things are revealed in Stephen Hawking's and Leonard Mlodinow's new book “The Grand Design”. The photo of the entire picture of the sky comes from this book, and it allows the experts see to a distance of 13.7 billion years, i.e. all the way to the Big Bang. (NASA/WMAP Science Team)
Identifiers: Entire picture of the sky
Thursday, November 17, 2011
Florence 2007
Oulu celebrated its 400th anniversary in 2005. I offered the Oulu Art Museum my “100 Pictures of Oulu” for display. Many people had already become familiar with them on the Internet. The Oulu Art Museum was not a damn interested in my works. A little later, the Florence Biennale inquired if I was willing to bring my works there. Aha, I thought, we are now moving to a new era. I sent some of my works, and even visited Florence myself – to see the Uffizi Gallery. Invitations to different parts of the world started to come after that. The Internet is a wonderful instrument. It made a local artist into an international one.
Identifiers: Florence 2007, exhibition
Letter from Heikki Partanen, 1988
We old people remember Hinku and Vinku in 1967. We could say that the tradition of fine Finnish animation films started with the “Käytöskukka” created by Heikki Partanen and Riitta Rautoma. I became friends with Heikki in the 60's. When he committed suicide in 1990, I dug out the letter that Heikki sent me in 1988. I append here part of the letter which says more than I could see at the time when I received it.
Identifiers: letter
Friday, November 11, 2011
11.11.11
Collard greens as a model on this unforgettable day 11.11.11. Indisputably it is, in all its modesty, one of the most beautiful flowers.
Edibly beautiful!
Wednesday, November 9, 2011
Erno's Thanks
Soon after his departure from Oulu, I received this letter from Erno in Hämeenlinna.
I must have been an important link for Erno when he came to Oulu. I knew Oulu and people here, I had a car and I was teaching at the university, whose hierarchy seemed appalling to me. I was thrilled to meet a highly intelligent self-educated man. We were suitably similar and dissimilar. We met almost daily for the three years that Erno spent in Oulu with his family. Erno once wanted to show me where he comes from. I shot a photo of him walking along the way that he had built himself to the Kuikero farm at Varejoki, Tervola.
Identifiers: letter
Tuesday, November 8, 2011
Roses
Edvard Munch said in his youth that he will probably always paint women, only women. Munch kept his word. I say in my old days that I will probably paint the rest of my life flowers, only flowers.
Identifiers: Flower, What I am going to do now
Sunday, November 6, 2011
The Books on My Bedside Table
By reading I establish contacts with the past and current world. After all, I don't really go anywhere nor do I meet many people. My bedside table tends to be occupied by books that need to be read for a longer time. There is a radio set equipped with headphones next to me. I listen to it quite a lot – news, records and language courses.
Identifiers: books
Saturday, November 5, 2011
Trying to See What Is Close
We have a tendency to imagine and grasp for things which are far away. Everything significant seems to be somewhere else. On the contrary, I believe that important things are close to me. I can find an interesting theme in something as simple as a bunch of flowers. The rose with its thorns is a basic flower. Let's see what I can make out of it!
Identifiers: What I am going to do now
Letter to Heaven
Once in July 1982, during a “symposium” that had lasted quite long, Paavo Rintala truly wanted to approach my parents in the kingdom of God by letter. Right off he scribbled a letter, with an envelope and stamp as well. I only opened the letter now. This is what he wrote:
The previous year, 1981, I had made a documentary for TV2 on one of our sessions in the train. It also ended up being absurd, as my purpose had been to put Paavo on the rack and make him tell about himself and his doings. Paavo turned the setup the other way round. He started to tell in detail about my youth...
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