VERSIONS – Kirsimaria E. Törönen

Opening on Friday, July 21st, from 6–8 PM. Free entry. Welcome!

I am a draftsman striving to break free from paper. My starting point is always drawing, which I apply in various ways—from site-specific works to traditional drawings and three-dimensional pieces. I detach from paper, carrying drawing into different materials and spatial works. From drawings, I create reliefs, collages, and site-specific installations.

I engage with art and cultural history, interpreting them from new perspectives. The human experience and the essence of being human are present in all my works in one way or another. The canon of art history consists largely of men labeled as geniuses, making its perspective highly polarized, narrow, and heteronormative. By reinterpreting classical works and their models, I aim to break this rigid canon.

The Versions exhibition presents works from three of my series: Modelling Poses, Hommage à Vionoja, and The Origin of Happiness. Through these works, I strive to make the invisible visible, to transform objects into subjects, and to give voice to the marginalized.

The Modelling Poses series consists of interpretations of European art history works that hold significance for me. I have seen all the original works that serve as my inspiration. It is essential for me to physically visit and spend time with these pieces before beginning my own version.

Over the past two years, I have studied paintings by Ostrobothnian artists Veikko Vionoja and Justus Sarisalo. My exploration of Vionoja’s works was prompted by curator Veikko Halmetoja between 2021 and 2022.

The resulting series, Hommage à Vionoja, was exhibited in its entirety during the summer in the exhibition The Black Curtain and Other Drawings at Taide Vionoja & K.H. Renlund Museum, curated by Veikko Halmetoja. In the autumn of 2022, I spent four months in the Ateljé Stundars residency, where I became captivated by Justus Sarisalo’s Ostrobothnian landscapes, human figures, and moods. This exhibition features the first completed works from my ongoing series The Origin of Happiness—the plywood reliefs Gubbe and Gumma.

I have been a professional artist since 1993 after graduating as a printmaker from Willem de Kooning Academy, Rotterdam University of Applied Sciences, in the Netherlands, with painting as a minor. I am currently working with a three-year multi-disciplinary grant from the Finnish state (2022–2024) in my studios in Mänttä and Ivalo.

I have been awarded the Mikkeli Prize by the City of Mikkeli in 2011 and the South Savo Art Prize by TAIKE (Arts Promotion Centre Finland) in 2016.

Kirsimaria E. Törönen

Translated with ChatGPT