Liisa Hilasvuori
Portfolio 2009-2020
For humas and beetles – The Secret of Garden 2022
In an exhibition in Järvenpää art museum there were works of the artists of `The golden era´ of Finnish art (1880-1910) and from three present days artists, me being one of them. I displayed four installations, were the nature is seen from very close: they depict bugs and seeds. I completed two of my ceramic series with new parts. Two new works continue the theme of insects.
The Loosing Team, 2020, 2022
I complited the series of pollinators with three new sculptures. The species live in Finland, bees, a bumle bee and a gadfly. Many insects have nowadays bacome endangered. I depicted them big, so that the viewer can see them as equal to humans. The results of the loss of insects for humans ans other nature can be unpredictable.
Beginnings, 2017-22
I have made the first sculptures of this series without a thought of collecting together an installation. For this exhibition it became a collection of seeds mainly of trees. A seed is a strange package: it contains instructions for the whole plant, that can live for hundreds of years. A seed itself can stay in dormancy for years until it lands in a wright place and grow roots. It is in a state between living and non-living. I tried to look closely and depict detailed.
The Ghost Writers
I have paid attention to the tunnels carved by bark beetles on the trunks of old trees since I was a child. The tunnels are like maps or writing. Also the small and humble plants, like lichen and moss are fascinating. The scupture of a bench is a base for carvings and small ceramics. I tried to create layerdness similar to nature: the living grows on dead matter. On the bench there is a pile of old garden and nature books and in between ”the tunnels of the beetles” writing, imaginary extracts from the point of view of small animals living in garden.
Small Wonders
I have depicted the larvae of Finnish butterflies. They can live as a larva for several years. With clay one can mould and depict the larva`s folded flesh.
Floating, decaying, perishing 2022
Our joint exhibition with Saara-Maria Kariranta and Eeva-Maija Priha in Gallery Uusikuva in Kotka was built around the theme of time as a process of breaking, wearing and layering. In addition to some of my older works there were three new works on a theme of insects.
The Ghost Writers
`The Ghost Writers´ is an old garden school book with sculptures of bark beetles on it. In nature, the beetles carve paths under a tree bark as if writing in old calligraphy. They benefit from climate change.
Enigma
In the installation five ceramic sculptures resembling pots stand on a high table and above them, a flock of dark butterflies spread their wings. The pots are formed like butterfly pupas. Pupas are interesting and detailed but, at the same time, hiding the developing butterfly. The frozen forms protect the butterfly’s transformation. A ceramic pot is a human invention for preserving food.
`The Last Treasures´
The installation is a collection of beetles in a glass display case I made for it. The inspiration comes from beetles living in Finland, and the small variations between different species. The glaze colours are not strictly realistic. The insect collection made, not by finding or capturing them from nature, but by making magnified sculptures of them, is a somewhat twisted idea. Natural science collections remind me of the human need to preserve, organize and explain but also to control and destroy.
Road game 2021
The Road Game exhibition in Gallery Huuto in Helsinki in December 2021 was a collaborative project between myself, Leena Kangaskoski and Emma Rönnholm. A series of ceramic sculptures formed a kind of a crossword puzzle on the gallery’s chess patterned floor. A series is made by one artist, but at the point where two series cross the starting point for the next sculpture is a feature from the previous artist’s work. The entire sculpture becomes a word game. The names of the individual sculptures also form a crossword puzzle.
The theme of the work centred on change and the pressure to constantly improve and train ourselves at work, in human relationships and as a person. Each of us gave form and size to the vague concept of self- development. We worked together and found inspiration in the others’ art and the differences in our artistic expressions.
The installation included glass plates supported and illuminated on kiln columns. The light effects were realised by Pietu Pietiäinen.
Road game, about 70 ceramic sculptures, glass, light
Imprisoned 2021
The theme of the Finnish Light Art Association FLASH exhibition in Suomenlinna Sea fortress area in November 2021 was light and death. My light installation was in a former army prison’s Kasserisiipi. The place has been used as cells for “red” prisoners after the Finnish civil war, many of whom waited for the death penalty to be carried out. The small booths were later used as police cells.
In my installation the space was divided in two with bars. On one side, behind a transparent film, there was a swarm of weakly fluttering moths. Some of the paper moths had spread to the bleak corridor side and on the stove. A light shone from behind the bars.
I wanted to compare moths to people who had become repressed, the randomness of life and to fear.
Death of a House 2021
I held a performance entitled “Death of a house” at the Artists’ Association Muu’s Booked - artists’ Book Fair in the Cable Factory in Helsinki. The performance was based on my trips to a courtyard of an abandoned house in Häme. The house seems to have been torn away from time, left empty already decades ago. I measured the yard with my steps, peered inside through the remnants of curtains, pondered about the rusted tools in the shed. I found an old sauna which was already growing spruce saplings. Once man-made, it had started becoming part of nature again, slowly. I constructed the house with words in my performance. I reflected on time, decay and death. The performance included a cardboard model of the house which I had made and covered in 1930’s newspapers.
photos Emma Rönnholm
Otteita rajoista 2021/
About boundaries
I took part in the interdisciplinary art festival, Aletheia Fest, in August 2021. My installation “Discussion at the water’s edge” was displayed there in a new environment. I also had a new speech performance.
The performance is about my visit to the island of animals, the zoo. The zoo was built to house animals, but primarily it was built for people. The performance is based on a story I wrote on site, on the island, watching the animals, observing people for example on guided tours and the visiting seagulls. I stayed in the zoo after closing.
A zoo is a peculiar place; partly nature, partly human constructed. Many animals are there because of some protection program but at the same time for people to look at. I tried to put into words my human feelings when encountering the animals.
Coastline Sculpture Project 2021
The Coastline Sculpture Project was a cooperative project between six artists. It was realised as an exhibition of sculptures in the spectacular location of Hanko in the southernmost coastal area of Finland in July 2021. In addition to myself, the other sculptors were Leena Kangaskoski, Ida Koitila, Tiina Rantanen, Emma Rönnholm and Salla Vapaavuori.
The project was started the previous autumn, in August 2020, when the group rented a communal space in order to visit Hanko and its surrounding area; the marine nature, the old buildings and remnants of war. We returned to Hanko in June 2021 and started the project. Each artist chose a specific site for their work. Mine was called “Discussion at the water’s edge”: eleven wooden sculptures of beaks of birds that live on the shoreline. The work also included stories related to the visual part. The exhibition was realised in cooperation with Harha mobile app. The stories related to my work can still be read on Harha (in Finnish).
Hanko is a resting place for migratory birds on their way to north and their way back south. According to current knowledge bird sounds are the nearest equivalent to human speech and some sounds can almost be imagined as words. The shapes and forms of the beaks have adapted to their surroundings. I used pine wood for the beaks and they are placed on the trees along the shore. The related stories are imaginative glimpses to a nature community where all the different parts form an entity.
Disscussion at the water´s edge, eleven parts, photos (except the fourth one) Sandra Kantanen, sizes 20-80 cm
Näkymä -environmental art exhibition 2020
I took part in an environmental art event “Näkymä 2020” in Akaa in Häme. I spent four days there constructing two works for the park near Nahkialanlampi pond, next to the traditional wallpaper factory Billgren&Ritola.
What remains (plywood, paint, old wall paper, height about 2,4 m)
Co-operation with a tree (willow, robe)
Matkan päästä kaikki on pientä / From Distance Everything Look Small 2020
I exhibited five artworks collectively named ‘From a distance everything looks small’ in the Art Centre Mältinranta in Tampere. I think the installations worked well together as the idea and themes came from the threats we face in the present day world. I relate to the themes although they do not necessarily recreate anything that I myself have experienced. The constant flow of news make it feel as if I was there myself. The regular updates make distances disappear and it all feels like happening right here, right now. The refugee crisis, bacteria and viruses stalking us in airports and cracks of our bathroom walls causing epidemics and the growing cities that swallow natural resources around them are illustrated in material form in the exhibition. The works were also inspired by the high windows and light blue tiles of the space.
Epidemy (ceramics, objects, height about 125 cm, length about 150 cm)
The Loosing Team (five parts, glazed ceramics, heights 15-25 cm). In the three lower photos the work in a summer exhibition ArtUp Punkaharju, Saimaan taideluola, Savonlinna.
The Demolition Site (old furniture, wood, light, height about 150 x length about 150 x depth about 80 cm)
The Thunderstorm tent (video and sound installation, which creates a storm to be experienced inside the tent, with moving shadows of trees, varying light and sound refering to tempest, but also to war with for example sounds of aeroplanes and a dog barking). Thanks to Ari Keltamäki for realization of the sound of the work with his equipments.
Light pollution (dimout fabric, two parts, height about 260 cm)
A performance about ravens 2019
I exhibited five artworks collectively named ‘From a distance everything looks small’ in the Art Centre Mältinranta in Tampere. I think the installations worked well together as the idea and themes came from the threats we face in the present day world. I relate to the themes although they do not necessarily recreate anything that I myself have experienced. The constant flow of news make it feel as if I was there myself. The regular updates make distances disappear and it all feels like happening right here, right now. The refugee crisis, bacteria and viruses stalking us in airports and cracks of our bathroom walls causing epidemics and the growing cities that swallow natural resources around them are illustrated in material form in the exhibition. The works were also inspired by the high windows and light blue tiles of the space.
photos Titta Putus-Hilasvuori
The moment of seeing / One to one hundred thousand 2018-2019
Visual artist Sanna Pajunen and I had a joint exhibition in the Cable Factory in Helsinki. The high exhibition space inspired us both to make something that hangs in the air. I produced two installations, one being a school of medusas splitting the air space and the other named ‘The Gang’ which was three very large drawings of ravens. I have shown the work ‘The Gang’ three times and each time I have added something to complete it.
The Gang, (crayon drawing on paper, the height of the highest part about 195 cm, four parts). First two photos from Muu Kaapeli gallery, third and fourth from P-galleria, Pori, last photo from Art Fair Suomi in Cable Factory, where the work had a sound, “ravens disscussion”, to be listened through headphones.
Thanks to Ari Keltamäki for realization of the sound part with his equipments.
The Bloom (about 20 parts, fabric and rattan, the sizes of the parts vary, diameters 40-90 cm)
Maalaamisen filosofia/The philosphy of painting 2017
The video was made in co-operation with media artist Markus Renvall. At the centre of the work is an art course at a disabled people’s home where a taught for a couple of years. I became interested in the intimate communication between the disabled person and the assistant. The communication requires not only speaking, but also alternative communication methods. When the pencil or brush is held by two persons making an imprint needs mutual understanding. The video shows the working process of six maker-assistant pairs during one session. It contains three interviews with staff describing what the course means to the residents of the home and how they assist in the process. The tenth part of the video shows painter Maaria Märkälä at work and captures the professional artist’s thoughts. The eleventh part of the video turns the camera onto the makers of the document and show our thoughts. Communication requires the will to understand the other. Painting is both a mental and a physical activity. The work was shown as a five channel version at Art Fair Suomi in the Cable Factory in Helsinki in 2017.
Haavehakemus/Dream application 2017
Artists’ Association Muu includes a group of artists interested in writing. They organised an event Textual Rendez-vous at Art Fair Suomi 2017. Four artists had workshops on different aspects of encountering audiences and writing. My workshop was about writing applications, making a Dream Application. It’s aim was to help clarify their plans and realise them through a form based on grant applications. The work calls for people to dream but also points to the practices in art where the creative process can often start in a sobering way, by applying for funding.
Duo kutsunäyttely / Duo show 2017
The Association of Finnish Sculptors invited me and sculptor Anneli Sipiläinen with a long career to a to Duo-show. We both made our exhibits independently. I constructed two new installations. In the front room where the visitors first entered I had a high structure of an old pier on a sea front. On the surface of the pier I had made a colony of small sea creatures from ceramics. In the windowless back room I had a work entitled ‘The Avalanche’. The work shows layered soil and the uncontrollable movement of masses of soil.
The Piers (wood fibre plate, veneer, glazed ceramics, height about 3 m)
all photos Satu Salonen-Karabulut
The Avalanche (the other part: drawing collage from the copies of the original drawings on wood and metal structure, the other part: pleksy glass, dyed papier machèe and nature materials, hight about 3 metres)
Vaeltavat puut ja tuttavallisen kokoinen vuori /Roaming trees and a friendly size mountain 2015
In the spring of 2015 I had an exhibition at Gallery Rajatila in Tampere. The works were inspired by a residency period in Iceland in 2013. In the light upstairs space I exhibited four works: moths made of paper in the windows, a pencil drawing hanging from the ceiling, an installation of moss growing on top of a desk and a piece of a concrete floor. The cellar of the exhibition space is dark without windows. I installed two,works in that space showing the Iceland residency building at night.
”a work about how a mountain folds” (pencil drawing on a structure made of wood, metal and canvas, lenght about 150 cm), also pencil drawigs connected to the theme.
”a work about how life is of paper” (painted paper and fans)
photos on left and above right Peter Rosvik
”a work about how moss fills the depressions” (objects, printed photo, a piece of forest floor)
The piece of forest floor was sponsored by Piiraisen Kuntta
a work of concrete
”a work about how cars are passing by” (a robot car, arduino, ply wood, pleksy glass, wall structures). Sometimes a car with its lights on is driving by the window and the lights cast moving shadows from the silhouettes of trees on the walls of the gallery room.
Factory street gallery 2014
In May 2014 I had an exhibition at café -gallery Factory Street Gallery in Helsinki. The ideas for the exhibition were developed during my residency in Iceland. The space walls were covered with drawings of ravens, drawings of mice along the skirting board and a drawing of the Icelandic landscape hanging in the air. The café seats were replaced with sculptured chairs with legs and shoes of imagined visitors.
Koivussa lymysi muhkura, lammikossa lentokone ja takana kaduntäysi pimeää 2013
I had an exhibition with two other artists, Kati Lehtonen and Aki Turunen in Gallery Forum Box in August 2013. The last part of the title ‘a street full of darkness’ refers to an installation which I built in the dark room. It shows a section of a street at night, lit by a street lamp with gleaming asphalt. Asphalt is like the skin of a city lifted up onto scaffolding so that the lumpy underside can be seen. The material used is black plastic foam on which passing pedestrians’ shadows were painted and which glittering folio was glued. There was sounds from two loudspeakers of people coming and going. The work was a play between the heavy asphalt and the immaterial nature of light.
photos Filippo Zambon
Mitä kuvitella saattaa/Whatever you can imagine 2012
I had an exhibition with two other artists, Kati Lehtonen and Aki Turunen in Gallery Forum Box in August 2013. The last part of the title ‘a street full of darkness’ refers to an installation which I built in the dark room. It shows a section of a street at night, lit by a street lamp with gleaming asphalt. Asphalt is like the skin of a city lifted up onto scaffolding so that the lumpy underside can be seen. The material used is black plastic foam on which passing pedestrians’ shadows were painted and which glittering folio was glued. There was sounds from two loudspeakers of people coming and going. The work was a play between the heavy asphalt and the immaterial nature of light.
The materials of the work are for example wood fibre plate, stained veneer, painted wood, styrox foam, plastic tube and old wall papers.
The work has about 20 pieces. The materials of the ”flock of flying seagulls” are plastic nets, canvas, wire and in the ”sea” on the floor sprayed cotton coat on wood and metal structures.
Spraying of the cotton coat was sponsored by Decocoat.
There is a big door handle fixed on the gallery wall and below that a lock mechanism. Light shines through the key hole. Light shines also from the floor level, where also artificial plants ”grow”. Materials are wood, plastic and fake plants.
Gallery Vanha kappalaisentalo 2011
In 2011 I was one of the four artists having an exhibition in Vanha Kappalaisentalo Gallery in Porvoo which is housed in an old assistant vicar’s house. I had built a nameless installation made of birch twigs looking like a human-sized nest. In the protected building nothing is allowed to hang from the walls, so the nest was standing on wooden legs. There was light inside and a quiet sound of rustling was heard. There were also twig tentacles and creepers around. No sign of a possible inhabitant.
Lopputyot / the degree works 2009-2010
My Master’s degree dissertation in the Academy of Fine Arts included three works: installation entitled Fiskars, the 26th of December and an exhibition with two works, one entitled The Way and the other unnamed installation about breaking.
`Fiskars, the 26th of December´, installation with ten parts, (painted styrox foam, metal structures) 2009. The starting point for the work is an idea to depict a landscape as one could draw it, but concidering especially walking ”in the landscape”. I have drawn and photographed elements of landscape as 360 degrees wide, in Espoo, in Fiskars nature conservation area, standing on one spot. After that I chose and simplyfied elements in the drawings and designed the sculptures. I composed them to the space I had in use, to the corridor of the gallery of The Academy of Fine Arts to the hights and directions, where they had been in my sight when looking the landscape.
The second part of my final work in The Academy of Fine Arts was an exhibition `To be precise´, which was held in gallery Fafa in 2010. There were two works. Tie (The Road) is 9 metres long, uplifted piece of imaginery sand road, going from wall to wall. The material is styrox foam, nature materials and paint. Because it became so heavy, wooden supporters had to be built for it during the mounting.
The other work in the exhibition was ”Unnamed work about cracking”. Metallic pieces, forms of cracking were hanging in the air and a fog machine made the air itself visible. Lights casted shadows of the pieces on the walls.
Olinpaikka / A place to stay 2008
My first solo exhibition during my study years in the gallery of the Academy of Fine Arts in Helsinki in 2008. There were five installations, three of them filling their own room and two smaller ones were attached to a wall and the ceiling. The individual art works were unnamed, but the name of the exhibition, ‘A Place to Stay’ describes the idea of installations: an art work is a place where a person enters, walks about and stays. An installation can also be an interpretation of being in the world at one specific moment and in one specific space.
Metallic labyrinth resembling shop gates could be accessd and the gates could be opened by walking against them. One can not enter the gate by walking to another direction and it`s difficult to guess the right way just by looking. One has to find the way only trying.
all the photos Tommi Keränen
The five photo collages are printed on flag material. They depict drinking water reservoir in Suomenlinna Sea fortress, seen from many directions, combining details.
The work is a vaulted space made from metal wire. hight about 30 cm.
The work is a light installation: The structure in the middle of the room is built from drawings made on pleksy glass by copying what one sees throught the glass when standing in the space. The room is in the wall in Suomenlinna Sea fortress. The halogen lights inside the structure cast each drawing on the wall of the gallery room. Two places merge.
In the ceiling of a dark room there seems to be a cover of a sewer system and a concrete cylinder continuing the system. Light shines from above. There is also a sound of running water in the sewer system.
Puun muisti / The memory of the tree 2006
Sculptor Radoslaw Gryta worked as a teacher in the project called The Memory of the Tree, were we made sculptures from old lime trees that were cut from Hämeenpuisto park in Tampere for safety reasons. The trees returned to the park as art works, which stood there years 2006- 2008. My work was called Home.
The sign by the installation: ”My art work is a skeleton of a house and a home at the same time. The scale does not challenge the trees, the house is in the shade of the trees and maintain their power. The axe marks leave the surface lively and the nots remind us of the past living trees. The window frame is like the eye of the house to look in and out of. Welcome.” I got the model for the window from a photo of Pispala wooden house area.
