HANNA KANTO

Beam of Life

8 April - 29 May 2016

Oulu Art Museum

Oulu, Finland

Hanna Kanto gets inspired by the rugged landscape and the traditional culture of her northern homeland. She keep the minimalistic and inhospitable northern landscape and its people as a reference point for her art. The thematic arc of her art is supported by a concern about the disappearance of a unique cultural environment. Even though certain nostalgia and sorrow is present, the paintings are above all elegiac shots of the northern landscape and its original and rich cultural heritage. Kanto also explores and studies herself inside the landscape, how it is to live and dwell as a woman in the North.

Moreover, in her expression you can find numerous references to explorers who arrived in the northern parts of Finland and Sweden throughout the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries. To give few examples: Maupertuis and Louis Philippe during the 18th Century, the La Recherché-expedition during the 19th Century and Kaarina Kari during the 20th Century. Their journeys to the North were explorations of nature and life itself which unveiled new findings. In Kanto`s artistic work she assumes a position of an explorer and adapt their methodology.

Kanto`s body of work consists mainly of acrylic and oil paintings, but when the topic requests it, she builds installations and produce video art around the theme. She uses the medium of painting both in a diversified and experimental way.