The Rings of Saturn
Makasiini Contemporary
13.9. - 6.10.2024
‘When Raisa and Misha invited me to be a character in one of their paintings, I first didn’t know how to react. I felt mystified, flattered, giddy with doubts and demands. I didn’t know very well what to expect, I had never been in a position like this before. Well, I think no one knew what was supposed to happen, why we were here, why us.
My friends would warn me: are you sure you want to spend your days in an outlandish room surrounded by bizarre types? Wouldn’t you be better off on an impeccably painted coastal landscape? Raisa and Misha kept reassuring us with kind demeanours and gentle humour. Let’s go for it, and see what happens, I thought to myself. At that moment, they had their eyes full of light.
Despite the chaos of colours, the cloudy forms, the black tablecloth, the dodgy wallpaper, I started to settle in and feel cosy quite quickly. At times, it seemed I had a sand clock in front of me, some other times, a cute little bottle that reminded me of Morandi. Outside, there was snow. But perhaps, it was not made of snow. One time they painted my thoughts there in front of me, like a balloon melting in the bathrobe of the person opposite on the table. There were occasions when I ended up with my fingers interlaced with the person on my left. Often, I look at my skin: how it changes its colour, its density, its tonicity, its luminescence, and I’m not sure, but I think I exist.
Today, they bought me a new David Bowie t-shirt. I also noticed an unusual poster on the wall –it offered a distant taste of meaning to my so far, otherwise, aimless existence. No matter how much I look for them, up until now I have never been able to find my legs. I feel a strange complicity amongst my fellow table dwellers, as if we shared the knowledge of something premonitory, grandiose, terrible, animal, without having to utter a single word. The more I spend time with them the more I realise they are, like me, dynamic open processes: undefined, woolly, and unpronounceable. My moods, and the connection with the other types flow and shift depending on the day, on the grip of the brush on the paper, on the hand that moves the brush, on the mind that moves the hand, on the heart that moves the mind, on the morning cup of tea that moves the heart.
When I get a moment for myself, which is not often, I like knitting ghostly stories, as W. G. Sebald would. One day, I got mesmerised looking at the moon, perhaps more than I should ought to. I left without any understanding of her. Other days, I feel I’m not in the picture, but I'm looking at the picture.
Raisa and Misha like testing us. They like experimenting and playing with us, as if there was essentially nothing to lose. They throw at us the leftovers of the sea. They cap us with feathers, and they crown us with discarded cardboard. But I also like trying them out. I test the scope of their commitment towards us. We obviously need Raisa and Misha. But I believe they need us too. Without them, we are nothing. But without us, they aren’t much either (or so I would like to think).
This morning, Raisa and Misha told us again, with their hands still stained with blots of paint, that we matter, that our mere presence here is of consequence. And I feel the same: what is important to me, really, is just to show up. We are whispered all the time that we don't need to be anything different than what we already are. I don’t fully get what they mean, but I like hearing that kind of thing anyway.
Well, enough of this thinking and writing for now. I’ll just finish my tea, and get on with my day.’
Excerpt from Diaries of a Painting Character
My friends would warn me: are you sure you want to spend your days in an outlandish room surrounded by bizarre types? Wouldn’t you be better off on an impeccably painted coastal landscape? Raisa and Misha kept reassuring us with kind demeanours and gentle humour. Let’s go for it, and see what happens, I thought to myself. At that moment, they had their eyes full of light.
Despite the chaos of colours, the cloudy forms, the black tablecloth, the dodgy wallpaper, I started to settle in and feel cosy quite quickly. At times, it seemed I had a sand clock in front of me, some other times, a cute little bottle that reminded me of Morandi. Outside, there was snow. But perhaps, it was not made of snow. One time they painted my thoughts there in front of me, like a balloon melting in the bathrobe of the person opposite on the table. There were occasions when I ended up with my fingers interlaced with the person on my left. Often, I look at my skin: how it changes its colour, its density, its tonicity, its luminescence, and I’m not sure, but I think I exist.
Today, they bought me a new David Bowie t-shirt. I also noticed an unusual poster on the wall –it offered a distant taste of meaning to my so far, otherwise, aimless existence. No matter how much I look for them, up until now I have never been able to find my legs. I feel a strange complicity amongst my fellow table dwellers, as if we shared the knowledge of something premonitory, grandiose, terrible, animal, without having to utter a single word. The more I spend time with them the more I realise they are, like me, dynamic open processes: undefined, woolly, and unpronounceable. My moods, and the connection with the other types flow and shift depending on the day, on the grip of the brush on the paper, on the hand that moves the brush, on the mind that moves the hand, on the heart that moves the mind, on the morning cup of tea that moves the heart.
When I get a moment for myself, which is not often, I like knitting ghostly stories, as W. G. Sebald would. One day, I got mesmerised looking at the moon, perhaps more than I should ought to. I left without any understanding of her. Other days, I feel I’m not in the picture, but I'm looking at the picture.
Raisa and Misha like testing us. They like experimenting and playing with us, as if there was essentially nothing to lose. They throw at us the leftovers of the sea. They cap us with feathers, and they crown us with discarded cardboard. But I also like trying them out. I test the scope of their commitment towards us. We obviously need Raisa and Misha. But I believe they need us too. Without them, we are nothing. But without us, they aren’t much either (or so I would like to think).
This morning, Raisa and Misha told us again, with their hands still stained with blots of paint, that we matter, that our mere presence here is of consequence. And I feel the same: what is important to me, really, is just to show up. We are whispered all the time that we don't need to be anything different than what we already are. I don’t fully get what they mean, but I like hearing that kind of thing anyway.
Well, enough of this thinking and writing for now. I’ll just finish my tea, and get on with my day.’
Excerpt from Diaries of a Painting Character
Lapland-based artist couple Raisa Raekallio (b.1978, Kittilä, Finland) and Misha del Val (b. 1979, Bilbao, Basque Country, Spain) have been working together over a decade now on paintings, drawings, performance art pieces, curatorial projects, and podcasts.
All paintings in The Rings of Saturn exhibition have been created from a single image: a picture the artists took while sharing a meal in their home in the village of Sirkka. Despite sharing the same source, each scene radiates its own particular universe. Thus, in Prophet, an enlightened bearded soothsayer offers a vehement monologue in a room filled with works by Hilma af Klint – possibly cheap reproductions. In Black Star, a young lad, proudly wearing a David Bowie t-shirt, remains oblivious to the darkness outside, which is punctuated by snowflakes, or dots of light, or balls from a nearby golf course. In Saturnuksen renkaat —the work that lends the name to the series— there is a poster on the wall, that any moment might become an open portal to a different solar system. In Tykky, a large spruce tree, dominating the vista from a cabin window, bows down before the landscape it belongs to. The space-time fabric is torn apart in Ancestor from the Future.
Last year, Raisa Raekallio and Misha del Val were awarded the Artists’ Association of Finland Award for their unique approach to artistic collaboration. Their paintings are part of private and public collections throughout Finland including Wihuri Foundation Collection; the Lars Göran Johnsson Collection at Turku Art Museum; Saastamoinen Foundation Collection at EMMA, Oulu Art Museum, Rovaniemi Art Museum, and Aine Art Museum, amongst others.
All paintings in The Rings of Saturn exhibition have been created from a single image: a picture the artists took while sharing a meal in their home in the village of Sirkka. Despite sharing the same source, each scene radiates its own particular universe. Thus, in Prophet, an enlightened bearded soothsayer offers a vehement monologue in a room filled with works by Hilma af Klint – possibly cheap reproductions. In Black Star, a young lad, proudly wearing a David Bowie t-shirt, remains oblivious to the darkness outside, which is punctuated by snowflakes, or dots of light, or balls from a nearby golf course. In Saturnuksen renkaat —the work that lends the name to the series— there is a poster on the wall, that any moment might become an open portal to a different solar system. In Tykky, a large spruce tree, dominating the vista from a cabin window, bows down before the landscape it belongs to. The space-time fabric is torn apart in Ancestor from the Future.
Last year, Raisa Raekallio and Misha del Val were awarded the Artists’ Association of Finland Award for their unique approach to artistic collaboration. Their paintings are part of private and public collections throughout Finland including Wihuri Foundation Collection; the Lars Göran Johnsson Collection at Turku Art Museum; Saastamoinen Foundation Collection at EMMA, Oulu Art Museum, Rovaniemi Art Museum, and Aine Art Museum, amongst others.