Towards spacious abstraction
Johanna Pihlajamaa (born in 1973) uses a traditional
method of carving images onto birch veneer and transferring them through
printing press onto paper which endures multiple layers of printing.
However, she is not devoted to classical printing techniques and neither
does she aim at flawless repetition, but instead subordinates technique
to result. Application of colour onto plate offers such possibilities
of variation that are essential to her works. It often makes her artworks
unique.
Pihlajamaa works with both representational and abstract
expression. Her past series Ideas
of Motion depicts
motion, flight and continuity through images, which seem to be stopped
in mid-motion. Images are put in space against monocromatic background.
Same kind of handling of space is visible in works Reflection and Shadows,
which create an interesting conflict between space and spacelessness.
An almost invisible net is woven on top of an incorporeal colour field
creating a strong sense of tridimensionality. The net, however, is not
attached to its background, but lingers weightlessly above it.
In addition to content and compositional
solutions the new works share the same dynamic and rhythmic line. Even
if she uses a closed form, such as a cobweb or a sphere, which appears
in her latest abstractions, the line does not lapse into repetitive decoration
but enlivens the surface with a series of manifold forms.
The line itself
is precise and of uniform quality. Pihlajamaa carves it first on wooden
plate. The line becomes visible in the print as a mirror image, when
background colour is printed around it. Subtle colours slide on top of
each other, merge and emit a translucent glow. Yet, the image formed
by line remains sharp.
In her most recent works there is a noticable
change. Image is sometimes blurred like a hastily captured impression
of the subject. Line no longer yields to form to the same extent as before,
and therefore it has been forced to give up its former role as a constructor
of the picture. Shapes, especially circles and semicircles, have taken
over the surface. Because of their soft fade-out shades they no longer
share a distict, tridimensional borderline with the background. The overall
generosity of the picture makes the role of the dense forms even bigger.
As in earlier works, they still rise on top of the surface and leave
the background intangible.
Pihlajamaa makes skillful use of light. She
chooses complementary colours and prints them in several thin layers
on top of each other thus creating an impression of everchanging shades.
Colour surface breathes releasing through a variation of nuances that
change with the viewer´s position as regards to
the work, the amount of light and surrounding colours. Layers of colour
are transparent revealing one shade under the other.
Composition approaches
abstraction, but at the same time it has acquired calligraphic elements
emphasizing the relationships between signs. Painterly qualities make
these elements lighter. Yet, Pihlajamaa has disengaged herself from her
earlier habit of loading forms with meaning and now uses them purely
as tools for aesthetics. It is no longer significant to interpret her
works by the content matter of separate elements but rather observe the
overall picture as a cosmic perception, a detachment and real movement.
Veikko Halmetoja
translation by
Anne Paldanius
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