Tuomas Linna - Every little thing

Every little thing, 2020
Scale model with party-light, 25 × 12 × 15 cm

Taiteilijanero pantuaan miestaiteilijaa, 2020
Photograph, 29,7 × 21,0 cm (frame)

Everlasting fortune, 2020
Oak branch, 14,8 × 10,5 cm (frame)

I planted an oak tree with my parents in the 1990s. The oak is a holy tree to Finnish people. In the Kalevala, the national epic of Finland it is written: Whoever took a branch from it, took everlasting fortune.

I framed the everlasting fortune.

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Small piece of paradise, 2020
Four-leaf clover, 21,0 × 14,8 cm (frame)

I see shooting stars, 2020
Photograph, 59,4 × 84,1 cm (frame)

Bird that shat on me, bird that shat on us, 2020
Photograph, 29,7 × 21,0 cm (frame) each

He who has luck, he should hide his luck, 2020
100 markka note and 100 euro note, 42 × 29,7 cm (frame) each

I was a 12-years old when I found a purse and credit card. I took the card for safe-keeping. One week later I received an envelope containing one hundred finnish marks. It was a reward for my honesty. Proudly, I told my friends about this. One of them announced that I had found the purse he had previously stolen. I retained the money and my bad conscience in an envelope.

20 years later, I found a one hundred euro note in the giardini of the Venice Biennial. I carried my bad conscience in my pocket.

I framed the notes I had hidden away in 1997 and 2017.

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Tuomas Linna, Every little thing, 2020

Solo exhibition, Nelimarkka-museum, Alajärvi

Young Artist of the Year in Southern Ostrobothnia 2019, Tuomas Linna, presents his solo-exhibition Every little thing at the Nelimarkka-Museum in Alajärvi featuring photographs and ready-mades as well as related texts. Also on view is Linna’s installation Lingering in Rapalaakso that tells a story from his South Ostrobothnian family: the artist recounts digging for his great-grandfather’s lost glass plate negatives in Rapalaakso. With Lingering in Rapalaakso, Linna asks questions about life and his identity. The work conveys longing and the will to understand oneself and one’s life in relation to what has been.

Apart from the visual, multi sensoriality has become a feature of contemporary art: we speak of “the senses fusing with each other”, of the ability to sense what occurs inside one's body - or gravity and spatiality. When engaging with Linna’s installation the viewer’s audiovisual perception blends with other perceptions. It connects with the spectator’s own memories and experiences - including those that have unconsciously been stored in the body. Hence, the work does neither allow itself to be viewed merely in terms of its process of creation by the artist nor solely as an exhibited object. Much rather does every visitor participate in creating the artwork.

In the Every little thing -exhibition Linna has moved on from Rapalaakso. According to the artist, the focus is now on luck and happiness. What are they? Furthermore, the works of the exhibition invite to think about the inscrutable process of searching, finding and creating.

In Linna’s new works abstract thought connects with the material and sensorial: The thought or memory of luck is joined together in the branch of an oak. There is an arresting feel to the works. Through the arresting moments that the works create, the memories of one viewer connect to those of others. Time opens up, different events intertwine. Every little thing presents an opportunity to connect to the world, to what has been and what will be.

Linna’s work has been supported by the Kone Foundation and the Arts Promotion Centre Finland. The exhibition at Nelimarkka-Museum was supported by the Regional Council of South Ostrobothnia.

Soile Haapala
Deputy museum director
Nelimarkka-Museum, Regional Art Museum of Southern Ostrobothnia

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List of other works at exhibition:

Lingering in Rapalaakso, 2018
Variable media, variable size

Annaliisa Krage

Licht und Farbe 2 (light and colour 2), 2020

Oil on plaster, 6 x 2,5 x 1,5 cm

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Selected press:

Pasi Lapinkangas, Kaikki alkoi siitä, kun Tuomas Linna löysi maasta varastetun käsilaukun..

Ilkka-Pohjalainen, 24.3.2020