MERJA HEINO

Arising from architecture and botany


My artistic work can be shared techinically in two areas: paintings and videos.


IN MY PAINTINGS I deal with the history of architecture - items arising from the renassaince and barock architecture and ornaments, that have drifted in the visual culture of Europe since antiquity.


Originally these forms could be seen in the achanthus form in the capitals of pillars. During Renassainse and Baroque they got new manifestation in the fasades of buildings, and also  a new name - voluta. Same motifs were repeated during later centuries in architecture and also in furnitures, like in the shape of table stands. Nowadays these forms can be seen for example in wallpapers, wrapping papers of gifts, or in the design of perfume bottles.


In my paintings of archtecture and ornamental themes I reduce and transform this visual heritage to the context of contemporary art.


Beside these cultural ideas I work with themes arising from nature: landscapes and plants.

My landscape paintings concentrate on the experience of silence.


Both in landcsape and plant paintings I avoid the traditional manners of treating the themes. I use the same simplification and almost black-and-white colour scale as in my paintings of architectural themes.

IN VIDEOWORKS I play with plants by connecting flowers that do not belong together in nature. The vividness of the videos creates an opposite to the paintings.

Videos will always be shown always as a full-size projection an wall. So the flower and plants will fullfill the space, and the spectator will feel like being in a garden, a paradise.

In the year 2008 I founded a new website ARTINFO.  The aim of this site is to spread up-to-date information about visual art, exhibitions and art events in the Helsinki metropolitan area  as well as elsewhere in Finland. See www.artinfo.fi

Merja Heino
Helsinki, September 2011