"What happens along the way is almost always more important than the destination of the journey. The same is true of painting. In front of a finished canvas one should only remember the temptations of the ditch by the wayside. Remember what hurt, and what made you laugh between breakfast and wine in the evening. The fortune-telling dregs in the coffee cup, the ones that never really dried. The wet patch in freshly-laid concrete that clearly showed the Owl of Minerva winking but then dried and disappeared. A destroyed anthill and the architecture of hornets. A recollection of my father's tears, which were the tears of a giant.
Not everything becomes attached to paper or canvas. Not even laughter. A picture of laughter is nothing more than a little frolic around an agreed word. But neither do clowns make people laugh. They're not supposed to. They're the oldest members of the circus, who knew all its tricks from fire-eating to death-defying leaps. It's also called professionalism. It does not rely on inspiration. Their skill has been condensed into naive and deep action. For can there be anything sweeter, deeper in meaning, than licking a postage stamp that is too small with a tongue that is too big?
It is in a manner something like this that I hope I can paint. Without any mission. Only daily bewilderment before colours, forms and opportunities. I don't want to create anything that follows a definite line. On the contrary. As soon as a line or style begins to emerge, I reject it. A style is a suit of armour that is useful only to those who watch jousting at a distance.
If I were to believe in something higher, a higher hand, I would like to be a marionette made to paint. Heinrich von Kleist says that "the movement of a person without mannerisms can be performed only by a marionette portraying a human being." In front of an easel with the feet six inches above the stage. But since, to my knowledge, there are no higher hands I have to covet the law-like nature of change. Or then to create randomness myself."
Hannu Väisänen
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