Hannaleena Heiska
Blazing World

01. - 24.10.2021

Helsinki Contemporary is delighted to be hosting Hannaleena Heiska’s solo exhibition Blazing World this October. Heiska, who has recently worked mainly with charcoal, is bringing painting into her new exhibition after a long absence, and for the first time both these materials that are important to her are being shown in the same context. The dialogue between charcoal drawing and oil painting enriches the properties of the materials; the softness of charcoal is juxtaposed with the curved brushstrokes, the deep radiance of the paints exudes from the matt surface of the dark, earthy substance.

The timelessness of painting and the eternal nature of charcoal are reflected in literary references, which bring their own temporal perspective on the exhibition, on the history of women and on the modern world. Two novels – Margaret Cavendish’s The Description of a New World, Called The Blazing-World from 1666, which has been called the first sci-fi work, and Virginia Woolf’s Orlando from 1928 – and the materials that Heiska uses tie this body of works to her earlier production. Questions about humanity and its limits, especially in relation to other animals, are echoed in the states of flux and half-formed shapes in the depictions of unstable hybrids. With its themes Blazing World lives powerfully in our time, but past and future are also simultaneously present. The exhibition is like an imaginary collection of different found objects, imagined and existent – a relic of a utopia that is perhaps only just coming into being, or perhaps is already in the past.

The playfulness and humour of the tale of Orlando, who travels effortlessly through different ages and identities, come as a welcome counterweight to our own era, and have inspired Heiska to construct her own utopia. The Blazing World exhibition can be thought of as a refuge, where our own imaginations give us freedom and space to breathe even in the midst of this distressing time.

In the context of this exhibition the figure of Orlando also represents artisthood, authorship and the challenges of the creative process. Heiska’s own relationship with painting has grown stronger as the process has advanced, and the deep historical significances of the medium and the profession have been accentuated in the present moment. She paints alla prima; with each work coming about in an instant. The technique involves a lot of uncertainty and, conversely, trust in the medium – in painting. “The magic of painting is endlessly fascinating. It is a medium that can never be exhausted,” Heiska says.

Hannaleena Heiska (b. 1973) has actively participated in exhibitions around the world since graduating from the Academy of Fine Arts, Helsinki, in 2006, including: the 4th Ural Industrial Biennial of Contemporary Art in Ekaterinburg; EMMA – Espoo Museum of Modern Art, Espoo; Espace Louis Vuitton Tokyo; CAC – Contemporary Art Centre, Vilnius; Bomuldsfabriken Kunsthall, Arendal; and Momentum – Nordic Biennial of Contemporary Art, Moss. Heiska’s first solo showing in Sweden was at Gothenburg Museum of Art in 2015, and in 2019 she had a solo show at Turku Art Museum. In 2011, she was a candidate for the Ars Fennica award. Her works are in numerous public collections, including: Museum of Contemporary Art Kiasma; Gothenburg Museum of Art, Saastamoinen Foundation; and the Jenny and Antti Wihuri Foundation. The collaboration between Hannaleena Heiska and the dancer Minna Tervamäki will continue in March 2022, when the Ateneum hosts two performances of The Trace, which combines painting and movement. Thanks to the Arts Promotion Centre Finland (Taike), Greta and William Lehtinen Foundation and VISEK Centre for the Promotion of Visual Art for supporting Heiska’s work.