Jyrki Parantainen (born 1962) is a Finnish photographer. Who's Who 2015, p. 667

Life and work

Parantainen was born in

Tampere Tampere is a city in Finland and the regional capital of Pirkanmaa. It is located in the Finnish Lakeland. The population of Tampere is approximately , while the metropolitan area has a population of approximately . It is the most populous mu ...

Finland Finland, officially the Republic of Finland, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It borders Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of Bothnia to the west and the Gulf of Finland to the south, ...

, and lives in

Helsinki Helsinki () is the Capital city, capital and most populous List of cities and towns in Finland, city in Finland. It is on the shore of the Gulf of Finland and is the seat of southern Finland's Uusimaa region. About people live in the municipali ...

. He is part of

The Helsinki School The Helsinki School was a name introduced in an article by Boris Hohmeyer, ''Aufbruch im hohen Norden'' (Breakthrough in the Far North), in Art Das Kunstmagazin in 2003. This was the first time it was used as a brand name to describe a selection ...

. Since autumn 2006, Parantainen has been working as a professor for photography at the

University of Art and Design Helsinki Aalto University School of Arts, Design and Architecture; ; ), was formed of two separate schools: the faculty of architecture (previously part of the Helsinki University of Technology) and the University of Art and Design Helsinki (UIAH, known in ...

, where he is responsible for the education of new people within The Helsinki School.

Style

Parantainen is influenced by the Russian film maker

Andrei Tarkovsky Andrei Arsenyevich Tarkovsky (, ; 4 April 1932 – 29 December 1986) was a Soviet film director and screenwriter of Russian origin. He is widely considered one of the greatest directors in cinema history. Works by Andrei Tarkovsky, His films e ...

, whose precise aesthetic is combined with what he himself called “the dirt of the world”. The effect of this influence in Parantainens pictures, are a combination of high

aesthetics Aesthetics (also spelled esthetics) is the branch of philosophy concerned with the nature of beauty and taste (sociology), taste, which in a broad sense incorporates the philosophy of art.Slater, B. H.Aesthetics ''Internet Encyclopedia of Ph ...

and gruesome reality. They are a mixture of

social realism Social realism is work produced by painters, printmakers, photographers, writers, filmmakers and some musicians that aims to draw attention to the real socio-political conditions of the working class as a means to critique the power structures ...

and socialist surrealism. He doesn’t picture reality but rather puts the manipulation of the photo in the foreground. His works are photographed photographs. He places metal wires, numbers and words upon the first print, to reveal some of the underlying themes of the picture thereby making it obvious to the observer, that these melancholic images are full of lost hopes and disappointments. Influenced by

Anselm Kiefer Anselm Kiefer (born 8 March 1945) is a German painter and sculptor. He studied with Peter Dreher and Horst Antes at the end of the 1960s. His works incorporate materials such as straw, ash, clay, lead, and shellac. The poems of Paul Celan h ...

, Parantainen works with social themes. Violence as a subject is often displayed in his works: violence through physical aggression in the fight for justice and self-assertion, sexual violence or as a means of suppressing people or peoples. In the series “Burning Interiors” he deals with human anxiety. Taking pictures of rooms on fire, he addresses the subject of human vulnerability. Fire erases everything: trails of an individual’s life, his personal story, his memories.

The artist on his work

“On a domestic scale, catastrophes appear everywhere around me; divorce, hate, irritation, as well as anger and a permanent state of misunderstanding to those closest to me. I feel there is an obvious impossibility to find harmony and a sense of well-being in those negative elements surrounding one. All this can simultaneously be seen as happening on a national and universal level. In these images, I try to create a certain amount of irony in order to present some ways of seeking satisfaction, which in my opinion easily appears in bizarre and even tragic acts of behaviour.

Exhibitions

He has been included in many exhibitions such as: “Dreams and Disappointments” at

Amos Anderson Art Museum Amos Rex is an art museum named after the publisher and arts patron Amos Anderson and located in Lasipalatsi, on Mannerheimintie boulevard in Helsinki, Finland. It opened in 2018 and rapidly reached international popularity, attracting more tha ...

, Helsinki, in 2006. „The 110’th Artist’s Exhibition“ at Taidehalli in Helsinki, 2005. He has also exhibited at museums like: Kulturhuset,

Stockholm Stockholm (; ) is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in Sweden by population, most populous city of Sweden, as well as the List of urban areas in the Nordic countries, largest urban area in the Nordic countries. Approximately ...

Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden, is a Nordic countries, Nordic country located on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. It borders Norway to the west and north, and Finland to the east. At , Sweden is the largest Nordic count ...

, at The New Art Gallery Walsall,

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

and the Haus am Waldsee,

Berlin Berlin ( ; ) is the Capital of Germany, capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and List of cities in Germany by population, population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the List of cities in the European Union by population withi ...

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...

. He was part of the travelling exhibition “Personally – Photographs from The Helsinki School”, 2005, that was shown in NBK; Berlin; Mannheim; Waldkreiburg; Stadtgalerie Kiel; Brandenburgische Kunstsammlung Cottbus – all in Germany.

References

External links

Parantainen at Galerie Wagner + Partner
{{DEFAULTSORT:Parantainen, Jyrki Finnish photographers 1962 births Living people