‘Sunset in a shoebox’
Exploring bohemian philosophy by Galleria Rankka and Durden and Ray

Artists: Mikko Paakkola, Marika Kaarna, Petri Hytönen, Aarno Rankka, Jyrki Riekki and Pekka & Teija Isorättyä (Helsinki) Justino Loza Gomez, Debby and Larry Kline, Stephanie Sherwood (Los Angeles)

Sunset in a shoebox features paintings, sculptures, installation and robotic art that track the lost wisdom of bohemians. It's a wild quest for perceiving the beauty of how one can ramble free on the Earth — free from institutions, restrictions, deadly taboos even though surrounded by the grayness of everyday life. This exhibition is a collaborative exhibition by a group of artists who are based in Helsinki (Finland), alongside artists from Los Angeles.

“Bohemians sought to live a life of creative freedom outside of materialism, violence, and other aspects of society they felt were corrupt.” This balancing on the fringes of one's own sanity and entering new worlds whilst keeping one's feet on Earth is apparent in the series of landscapes by Mikko Paakkola, which were painted at shoebox scale. Repeating a single act such as a small-scale landscape painting can allow you to recognize small moments of change and nuance in a way you may not if each action was wildly different from the previous.

Traveling from Helsinki, Finland, are seven artists from the rich community that has congregated around Galleria Rankka, an artist-run space with nearly 10 years of exhibits in the city. The magical realism of Marika Kaarna’s large paintings consist mainly of incidental encounters of mundane life. They imply a search through the altar of art, in the auroras borealis of visions and in deep dreams without negating everyday life. An installation of paintings by Petri Hytönen balance between the living, the dead, and madness. Hytönen’s ecstatic search spawns a Bohemian alter-ego who creates his path on the road yet stays on the surface without sinking completely into oblivion. The work of Aarno Rankka grapples with themes of labor: its intensity, the time it costs, necessary tools, commerce and faith. Laborious in their appearance, detailed figures hint at the amount of time and concentration necessary to create such objects; time which slips quickly through our fingers. Beasts and minions feast in the paintings and drawings of Jyrki Riekki. At most it can be reminiscent of baroque painting, but cut and shaken up for our own brutal, frightening age. Bohemian robot, portrait of the poet Charles Bukowski is an interactive robot sculpture by artist duo Pekka & Teija Isorättyä. The robot’s destructive features present the sublime imperfection of humanity.

Included in Sunset in a shoebox are four artists from Los Angeles, Justino Loza Gomez, Debby and Larry Kline and Stephanie Sherwood. Debby and Larry Kline, known as the Juggling Klines, create works which are political in nature and critical of larger systemic issues in America. Exemplifying a bohemian attitude, Consecrations of Gratitude by Justino Loza Gomez is a body of works created at bus stops around Los Angeles—star signs honoring friends made out of chewed bubble gum. Continuing the thread of works created in public without permission are works from Stephanie Sherwood’s Confine In Situ series which render loose, expressionistic paintings in sunset tones onto discarded furniture on streets and sidewalks.

Sunset in a shoebox honors the tradition of a bohemian lifestyle, which takes bravery and a commitment to following a creative path regardless of permission.


Thank you @kulttuurirahasto for support.

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