Gracias a la vida/Thanks to life/Elämälle kiitos

2009, oil on canvas 30x40 (each part)

in private collection

The whole autumn 2009 I listened a lot Violeta Parra's Gracias a la vida song. That song is about glorying your life and my father listened it a lot when I was a child. Then he also told me how tragic is the history of that song. After awhile releasing that song Violeta Parra commited suicide. Thought of that has haunted me in my entire life. I can't understand how someone can do such act after praising every little thing that she has had in her life.

And so I did what I usually do when I can't get out of my mind something... I painted that song... or more like the feeling of that song's lyrics. The melody is bit melancholic.

Listen Violeta Parra's Gracias a la vida here.

Finnish version of that song "Elämälle kiitos" by Liisa Tavi is very beatiful too. Jaana Lappo and Merja Onerva has done precise work when they translated the lyrics. Listen "Elämälle kiitos" here. 


Part two:

And part one:

Night in Kyoto/ Ilta Kiotossa

2009, oil on canvas 50x40 


in private collection

Japan theme continues :) This picture is painted from the movie: Memoirs of a geisha.

The nodding doll/ Nyökyttelevä nukke

2009, oil on canvas 30x40

in private collection

This picture is about one of my poems that I wrote few years ago. The poem is about one place where I'll never want to live again. That place was so pressing and restricting that I wasn't myself there. I felt like I was only a someone's muse, tiptoeing geisha and a nodding doll. 

However the geisha in this picture seems to have inner peace and happiness... and so have I... now. Like they say: "What doesn't kill you makes you stronger" or was it "what doesn't kill you, comes back again and try it even harder"? Nietzsche knew nothing!! ;)

Burning the ice/ Jäitä poltellessa

 

2009, oil on canvas 30x40 

I have a tendency to gather too much to do. I am interested about so many things and I want to make a difference several affairs and places at the same time. That makes me sometimes just too busy and I feel like I'm burning the ice.

There was only red, blue and titanium white in palette when I painted this.

As the rush comes/ Tulee kohisten

2009, oil on canvas, size of one part 55x45

Part One:

 

and part two:

Spring is always beautiful and energetic time in my life. Sun is bright and everything just comes to life, nature and people also.

Silence in a wheat field/ Ja minä olen viljaa

2009, oil on canvas 30x40 

They talk Shhht! about me

2008, oil on canvas 73x60

I hate gossips and gossiping people. I am aware that people have extremely diffrent opinions about me, some love me and some think that I'm the most irritating person in the world ;) And that's fine to me. However sometimes somebody starts to gossip about me, I don't like it but it's insignificant to me unless those talks hurt somebody of my close ones.

When I painted this, I often listened to the radio and there was this Matt Pokora's song "They talk sh*t about me" played over and over again. That song was catchy and the same time a little bit annoying, so what would be more appropriate name for this painting? ;)

Soleá

2008, oil on canvas 35x27

Overly.../Liian...

2008, oil on canvas 65x81

In private collection

Does anybody know the feeling when you are overly sensitive, when you have exposed yourself too much? Then you are just too bare and transparent without any protection...

Let's do some shopping!/Ostaosta!

2008, oil on canvas 30x40

I am a victim of fashion and commercials. I love fashion pics and I think that they are works of art. Those pictures are alluring, beautiful and creative. Fashion photographers have to be imaginative when they create images that are different and unusual. A fashion product has to be portrayed creatively while at the same time conveying style and classiness.

Same time that I love fashion, I hate it. I hate fashion industry, materialism and mass consumption. So I have to struggle between these things in me. Those both ideas are like some little lady sitting on my shoulder and whispering all those things to my ear.

Play with me!!/Leikimunkaa!!

2008, oil on canvas 40x40 

 I got inspired by a picture that I saw in a fashion magazine (don't ask what magazine that was, I can't remember). The pose of a model in that picture was just awesome. It was irritating and same time playful and funky.

Solve the riddle soon, Nancy Drew!/Ratkaisun hetki lähenee, Neiti Etsivä!

2008, oil on canvas 40x40

 It is tickling and exciting to make decisions that will have an effect to your whole life and change it forever. I love changes.

Cure me/Lääkitse minua

2008, oil on canvas 40x40

I've been told about hundred times that I'm like Scarlet O'Hara from the movie Gone with the Wind. I am strong, stubborn, determined, assertive and even difficult circumstances I stay calm and know what to do. BUT in relationship I have a tendency to act fragile, weak and vulnerable woman who needs to be rescued. 

Spilling/Kaatuuko?

2008, oil on canvas 40x40 

After I did "expecting company?" I kinda got stuck to paint bottles again. It was so much fun and relaxing to paint them. To be honest, when I started to paint this I have this vision of a lonely bottle with greenish backround and nothing else. And so I executed my vision... but it didn't work. I usually have so strong visions what I'm going to paint and when this idea didn't seem to work, I was kinda shocked. Then because of this reaction I started to laugh at my silliness and started to plan different kind of stuff with this bottle. First idea was ants climbing to the bottle and then came a surrealistic idea of little woman pulling the bottle down with a rope. So I think this little woman is me (again) and this bottle represent my frustration with this painting ;)

Expecting company?/Seuraa vailla?

2008, oil on canvas 40x54, 

on commission, in private collection

There are three colours and one white in this port wine composition. Only burnt sienna, crimson, brussian blue and titanium white in palette.


There's something about shape of a bottle. I have painted and drawn bottles since I was a child. So no need to decode any indications of alcoholism from my art :) Like I said there's something about shape of a bottle. Can't really tell what that thing is why I love bottles, I don't only paint and draw them, I also use them to decorate my apartment.  Bottles are usually very beautiful, round and because they are made of glass they are fragile, like people I guess. 

Inner goddess/Luulin pitkään, että olen jumalatar

2008, oil on canvas 81x100

Brush in my hand and my tongue-in-cheek ;) Reference naturally from Botticelli's masterpiece The birth of Venus. 

There lives more or less a little goddess, queen or a princess in every woman.

Miss spring and the early appearance/Neiti kevät saapui varhain

2008, oil on canvas 81x65 

Spring came really early in 2008. At least in Finland it did. In fact there was no proper winter in Finland that year, quite warm and hardly any snow.

Before the conflict/Hetki ennen konfliktia

2008, oil on canvas 35x27

What I hate more than anything in a world or in people is injustice. When I see someting that isn't just right, I'll fight. In that way I think I am a revolutionary but in a nonviolent sense.

Dancing on the edge/Tanssia hiuskarvan varassa

2008, oil on canvas 60x73

I love dancing. It has always been one of my greatest passions in life. It helps to deal with different kinds of emotions from joy to despair or sorrow even. It's also a fun way to keep in shape. 

I'm generally speaking very optimistic person. It doesn't mean I don't realise facts when things are looking bad, it just mean I always think that things are going to be ok. I don't get depressed  easily, when something unpleasant happens I usually feel down for one night and when a new day dawns I remember that I have eight lives left ;)

From dust/Maasta

2007, oil on canvas 70x95

Waiting for a cup of coffee/Kahvia odotellessa

2006, oil on canvas 40x50

In private collection

Two colours and one white. Only burnt sienna, prussian blue and titanium white in palette.

What can I say... I really LOVE coffee. By the time it meant several cups in a day. Now I haven't drank it for six months. I replaced it with green tea, because it's healthier =)

Bare disfigured/Rujo alaston

2006, oil and charcoal on canvas

Autumn leaves

2006, oil on canvas

Leaves are so colourful and beautiful in autumn. But it can also mean the time when some are leaving their families and some are planning to leave something else. I love wordplays! <3

Global warming/Ilmaston lämpeneminen

2006, oil on canvas

This subject is really close to my heart but I see things a bit differently than many other. I have written my thoughts into my other blog, but unfortunately it's in Finnish.

Lue ajatuksiani ilmaston lämpenemisestä toisessa blogissani. [kirjoitukseen pääset klikkaamalla tätä]

Aurochs/Jotain alkukantaista

2005, oil on canvas

In private collection

A modern cave painting and a modern caveman ;)

Lady behind the mask: Blue

2004, oil on canvas.

This is sort of self-portrait, or at least one part of it, like a reverse side of a coin. Other part of this self-portrait is called Drama Queen. 


This blue is kind of a loner, a traveller of her own path. She is an introvert, shy, very vulnerable and calm as a desert of Lapland. She is bare, disfigured and has a bad posture. She writes poems and keeps them hidden in her drawer and in her dreams she always escapes.

Few words about my paintings

I paint what I see and feel. Usually those "little women" that I paint are a reflection of me but I can see no reason why they have to look like me. I don't have that kind of fixation of my looks like for example Frida Kahlo did have. I like to observe things that are going on in our society and you can also find those features in my paintings.


My tools are brushes, oil colours, sometimes charcoal, acrylic or ink and a hint of self-irony.


I'm very interested in people and human behavior but sometimes I paint compositions or landscapes even.


Hope you enjoy!


-Minna-Maarit-

ps. feel free to bitch about my grammar errors! I would appreciate it :)