Category Archive
The following is a list of all entries from the Portugali category.
Exhibition Year 2023 / Ulla Karttunen
Participating in nine exhibitions in Rome, New York, Florence, Miami, Ponte de Lima, Salo and Helsinki were part of Ulla Karttunen’s artistic program in the year 2023.
Firenze Contemporary, the international contemporary art exhibition organised and curated by Rossocinabro Gallery from Rome was held in ArtArt – Armando Xhomo Gallery in Florence in February 2023.
In Rome, the international exhibition Welcome Spring was displayed in Galleria Il Leone from March 24 to April 7, 2023.
In April in New York, it was time to deal with a serious philosophical problem, the metaphysics of ice cream. The show Artbox Expo New York 2.0 was exhibited in The SoHotel Art Space Gallery, in Nolita district Lower Manhattan.
Handling with the connection between divinity and ice cream continued at the exhibition Under the Rainbow (Sateenkaaren alla). The show by Helsinki Artists’ Association Art Lending (Taidelainaamo), Helsinki, from June 12 to August 31, 2023.
The Eternal Feminine / O Eterno Feminino – Art’in Lima 2023, international summer exhibition was held in the historial buildings of the oldest town in Portugal, Ponte de Lima. Two large altar paintings by Ulla Karttunen were displayed at The Museum of Terceiros and The Chapel of Pereiras. The summer exhibition from July to September received around 16,300 visitors.
The 10th jubilee exhibition of Wiurila’s Summer: The Alchemy of Time (Wiurilan kesä: Ajan alkemia) was on display at The Wiurila Manor, Halikko, Salo, from June 16 to August 27, 2023.
The borderline between the real and the magic was processed in the artwork by Ulla in Spectrum Miami in Mana Wynwood Convention Center, Miami, December 2023.
Too much sugar! This warning should have been added to Ulla’s works in the exhibitions Syrup and Hope (Siirappia, Toivo) by Helsinki Artists’ Association Art Lending (Taidelainaamo), in January and December.
Final Weeks: Women in Flames
The Flamed Women altarpiece refers to women in history and today who have been tried to be excluded from the community and its cultural control by silencing, invalidating, normalizing or, as in the case of Joan of Arc, by burning. Features like affectivity and passion were long thought to be too low and feminine to be accepted by the cultural elite. The red-yellow haze of the flames alludes also to the mystic’s passion, dedication for ultimate truthfulness.
Witch or Saint? Whore or Holy Mother? Every woman in history is a Joan of Arc, or at least, has had her share of the fate of being nullified and excluded. Finally, this outlaw, spit upon for death, was elevated to something untouchable, like a saint, a symbol of the entire state.
Degrading by praising and objectification of women are also familiar from contemporary culture. If one traditional way of controlling women has been to associate females as wild nature to be tamed, capitalist culture is smarter and takes feminine seduction to the service of commodity production. A woman’s task is to burn herself as a promoter, monument and victim of consumer culture. A woman is wanted to be the embodiment of self-marketing, the selfie of all selfies, but not a whole and holistic being that manifests her intelligence with multiple and contradictory dimensions.
Why depict mystics or saints? Isn’t a being who withdraws into silence, meditates on the divine, or follows her truth, the most wrong type of character in modern times? Yes, and partly because of that. The mystic is marginal, but through such a figure one can examine parodoxical but also fundamental conditions of existence, from suffering to ecstasy.
- the text is taken from the catalogue ”Art’in Lima 2023 – O Eterno Feminino / Art’in Lima 2023 – The Eternal Feminine”, ed. by Ana Guerra & José Velho Dantas. Municipio de Ponte de Lima 2023, 242 pages, ISBN 978-989-98907-3-2
Last changes to see the exhibition Art’in Lima 2023, themed The Eternal Feminine. The exhibition in the historical sites of the oldest town of Portugal, Ponte de Lima, is open until 24 September 2023. The altar piece The Flamed Women by Ulla Karttunen can be found from the church of The Museum of Holy Art, Museu dos Terceiros.
Naisia liekeissä
Liekitettyjä naisia / Flamed Women -alttaritaulu viittaa historian ja nykypäivän naisiin, jotka on pyritty ulossulkemaan yhteisöstä ja sen kulttuurisesta määräysvallasta vaientamalla, mitätöimällä, normittamalla, tai kuten Jeanne d’Arcin tapauksessa, polttamalla. Affektiivisuuden ja intohimon kaltaisia piirteitä pidettiin pitkään liian alhaisina ja naisellisina, jotta kulttuurieliitti hyväksyisi ne. Liekkien läsnäolo teoksessa viittaa myös mystikon passioon, omistautumiseen sille minkä kokee totuudellisuuden äärimmäiseksi vaatimukseksi.
Noita vai pyhimys? Huora vai pyhä äiti? Nainen on näihin päiviin saakka haluttu määritellä ulkopuolelta, alistaa binäärisiksi vastakohdiksi, kuuntelematta sitä mitä hän itse on tai tahtoo. Jokainen historian nainen on Jeanne d’Arc tai vähintään saanut kantaa osan hänen kohtalostaan tulla vaiennetuksi ja ulossuljetuksi. Lopulta d’Arc, tuo hyljeksitty ja lainsuojaton, kuolemaan syljetty, korotettiin joksikin koskemattomaksi: pyhimykseksi tai koko valtion vertauskuvaksi.
Ylentämällä alentaminen ja naisen objektivointi on tuttua myös nykykulttuurista. Jos eräs perinteinen tapa hallita naista on ollut liittää tämä villiin luontoon, kapitalistinen kulttuuri on älykkäämpi ja liittää feminiiniset voimat, viettelyn ja aistillisuuden, tavaratuotannon palvelukseen. Naisen tehtävä on polttaa itsensä kulutuskulttuurin promoottorina, monumenttina ja uhrina. Naisen halutaan olevan itsemarkkinoinnin ruumiillistuma, kaikkien selfieiden selfie, mutta ei kokonainen olento, joka ilmentää älyään moninaisin ja myös vastakohtaisin piirtein.
Miksi kuvata mystikoita tai pyhimyksiä? Eikö hiljaisuuteen vetäytyvä, jumalallista meditoiva tai totuuttaan armottomasti seuraava olento ole mahdollisimman vääränlainen hahmo nykyajassa? Kyllä, ja osittain juuri siksi. Mystikko on marginaalinen, mutta tällaisen hahmon kautta voi tarkastella olemassaolon parodoksisia mutta myös perustavia tiloja: inhimillisen näkökyvyn rajallisuutta, sokaistumista, hurmioitunutta elämänvoimaa tai passion ääripäitä kärsimyksestä ekstaasiin.
- teksti on julkaistu englanninkielisenä versiona näyttelykirjassa ”Art’in Lima 2023 – O Eterno Feminino / Art’in Lima 2023 – The Eternal Feminine”, toim. Ana Guerra & José Velho Dantas. Municipio de Ponte de Lima 2023, 242 s, ISBN 978-989-98907-3-2
Feminiinisyyttä tarkasteleva näyttely Art’in Lima 2023 on avoinna Portugalin vanhimmassa kaupungissa Ponte de Limassa 24. syyskuuta saakka. Ulla Karttusen kaksi lähemmäs nelimetristä alttaritaulua ovat esillä Pyhän taiteen museossa ja Pereiras-kappelissa.
Liekitettyjä naisia (2023), alttaritaulu PVC-mainospressulle © Ulla Karttunen, Pyhän taiteen museon kirkossa (ylemmät kuvat) ja Mansikoiden, leopardien ja kukkien suojeluspyhimys (2023), alttaritaulu sametille © Ulla Karttunen, Pereiras-kappelissa (alemmat kuvat)
Alttaritaulu Mansikoiden, leopardien ja kukkien suojeluspyhimys esittelee unenomaisen jumalattaren, hahmon, joka muodostuu tulvivasta kukkimisesta ja runollisesta monimuotoisuudesta. Teos on omistus leikkisyydelle ja suloisuudelle, rohkeudelle ja villiydelle, ilolle ja toivolle. Koomisia sävyjä tuo mukaan se, että mansikat tai leopardit – tai varsinkaan leopardiestetiikan urbaani variantti, kimalteleva tekoleopardiprintti – tuskin kaipaavat kirkollista pyhittäjää.
Saint of Poetic Sensualities
Altarpiece The Patron Saint of Strawberries, Leopards and Flowers presents a dreamy goddess, a figure made of overflowing blooming and poetic ambiquity. The work is a dedication to playfulness and sweetness, courage and wildness, joy and hope. There are also comical undertones, with the notion that strawberries or leopards (or especially the urban variant, the glittering faux leopard print) don’t need clerical protection.
The work refers to feminine power that is not based on domination or using violence. Humans need a loving and questioning attitude, and are perhaps more made of sensuality and playfulness than aggressiveness and belligerence. We must leave behind the old glorification and heroification of all forms of toxic domination.
Humans are part of nature – the border between nature and culture is constantly changing. The work celebrates the feminine as a part of nature: you can feel your existence as sweet as a strawberry or bold as a leopard. One amusing aspect of nature’s intrusion into culture, to the point of cliché, is how urban streets and the media manifest, decade after decade, the popularity of leopard print.
The idea of man has already changed a lot; the younger men already seem to represent a whole new species. But in international politics, we have still witnessed the return of a warlike, toxic identity and the threats it brings. The background of the work can be found in the reality of last years, death and pain, the pandemic and war, and with these, the need to search even more firmly for what makes existence not only meaningful but also sweet.
In a secularized society, the language of values and the meaning of being is lost. My art deals with mystic figures or other religious symbols because I feel it is a way to deal with the innermost poetry of the soul.
- the text is taken from the catalogue ”Art’in Lima 2023 – O Eterno Feminino / Art’in Lima 2023 – The Eternal Feminine”, ed. by Ana Guerra & José Velho Dantas. Municipio de Ponte de Lima 2023, ISBN 978-989-98907-3-2
The Chapel of Pereiras is located on a hill in the heart of the old town
Feminine Vibes & Baroque Chapels
altarpiece Flamed Women by Ulla K. at the church of Museum Terceiros
International contemporary art exhibition Art’in Lima 2023, themed The Eternal Feminine, in Ponte de Lima, Portugal, continues until 24 September 2023.
There’s possibility to meditate feminine and/or eternal vibes in contemporary art. Historical buildings in Portugal’s oldest town act as gallery spaces for this exhibition, for example baroque churches The Chapel of Pereiras and Museum Terceiros.
altarpiece Patron Saint of Strawberries, Leopards and Flowers by Ulla K. at The Chapel of Pereiras
Ponte de Lima Opening Images
video from the opening of Art’in Lima 2023 here
altar painter Ulla K. with her work Flamed Women
Meanwhile in Another Church
Another altarpiece installation in Portuguese churches (in addition to the one presented in the last post) is located in The Chapel of Pereiras, Capela das Pereiras (image of the church above).
This almost four meter high digital painting on velvet canvas is not so furious and fiery as the altarpiece Flamed Women, but almost the opposite: pastel-like soft, liquid-like immaterial.
The Patron Saint of Strawberries, Leopards and Flowers, 2023, by Ulla Karttunen, altar piece installation with digital painting, sublimation ink on velvet canvas, 368×142 cm
some details of the work under:
Ulla Karttunen in front of her altar painting at The Chapel of Pereiras, Ponte de Lima
Ulla Karttunen’s Two Large Altarpieces in Portuguese Baroque Churches
Two several meters high altarpiece installations by the Finnish multidisciplinary artist Ulla Karttunen are presented in two different locations in Portugal. Ponte de Lima, the oldest town of the country, offers some incredible baroque churches, used as galleries of contemporary art. The exhibition Art’in Lima is open from beginning of July until 24th of September 2023.
Let’s first have a look at Museu dos Terceiros, the museum of holy art, where Ulla Karttunen’s altar painting Flamed Women is presented.
The Terceiros Museum consists of an architectural complex of two churches, a convent, and gardens. It was founded in 1481 as The Convent of Santo António. The buildings have gone through several alterations, especially 1744 – 1747, when The Church of Third Order of S. Francisco got its baroque style. Medieval art, monastic austerity and baroque excess meet in this whole.
Flamed Women, 2023, by Ulla Karttunen, altar piece installation with digital painting, pigment ink on pvc 330 x 170 cm, at The Museum of Terceiros
The Flamed Women, altarpiece by Ulla Karttunen, refers to women in history and today who have been tried to be excluded from the community and its cultural control by silencing, invalidating, normalizing or, as in the case of Joan of Arc, by burning.
Convento of Santo Antonio in Ponte de Lima 1780
chapel and altar 1975 and 2023
in the opening of the exhibition Art’in Lima
Weeping for Chapels
Donna Criminale by Ulla Karttunen, at Capela das Pereiras 2016
I arrived yesterday in Ponte de Lima, a small northern Portuguese town, where I have already participated twice in a large summer art event. First time, year 2016, the show was called Art Map, the second time, year 2018, Lethes Art.
What I love about Ponte de Lima are the old baroque churches and chapels. There are quiet, modest chapels, such as The Chapel of Pereiras on a hill in the middle of town, looking down on the town and the surrounding hills. There are overflowing baroque cathedrals, bursting with golden decorations, such as the two churches that form the sacred art museum, The Museum of Terceiros. I had no intention of participating again, but the thought of Capela das Pereiras suddenly made me almost weep with emotion. This religious-emotional state obsessed me to return to Ponte de Lima.
Seven years ago I built the ephemeral toilet paper madonna, Donna Criminale, at the Chapel of Pereiras (images above). Five years ago I made, in the same chapel, a five-meter-high an altar table installation:
Madonna of the Third and the Fourth Eye, 2018, by Ulla Karttunen, at Capela das Pereiras
The old trees along the Lima River and in front of the Terceiros Museum were as stunning today (above) as they were 5 years ago (below)
Opening on Saturday: Art’in Lima 2023
International contemporary art exhibition Art’in Lima, in Ponte de Lima, the oldest town of Portugal, will open 1 July 2023. This year the theme of the exhibition will be The Eternal Feminine. The exhibition will present 153 works by around 100 artists.
The exhibition venues are the different historical buildings of the town. The opening reception will start from The Chapel of Pereiras (Capela das Pereiras), where is also presented a new altarpiece installation by Ulla Karttunen. Another new work by Karttunen, a large sitespesific altarpiece installation will be presented at the museum of sacred art, The Terceiros Museum (Museu dos Terceiros).
Chapel of Pereiras last night (above) and a view to the town from it (under):
silent street in Ponte de Lima
two churches of the museum of sacred art, The Terceiros Museum
erään kadonneen kirkon tapaus [[ neitsythuorakirkko ]] 