The Young Artist of the Year 2011 is painter Anna Tuori (born 1976, lives and works in Helsinki). Anna Tuori is the 27th Finnish Young Artist of the Year.
The purpose of awarding the title of Young Artist of the Year is to stimulate conversation and promote the visibility of contemporary art. The exhibition and its accompanying book provide significant encouragement and support for the selected artist. The intention of the award is to support internationally interesting Finnish artists. One of those artists is Anna Tuori, who with her unique painterly language has spoken to Finnish and international art audiences for many years already, demonstrating her stylistic capacity for transformation. Recurring elements in Tuori’s works include dreamlike distorted worlds, disintegrating idylls, elements of horror, landscapes, faceless human figures and seemingly lost animals. However, the brushwork and the palette also occupy an important role in her art.
“That’s what the world is like. Or at least many things appear to be strange, with the safe, the familiar and the beautiful suddenly becoming frightening, alien and horrible, and then reversing again. There are strange and obscure things smouldering under the surface. Looking around carefully, you can tell most people are totally bonkers, and that’s not always a bad thing. The relationship between the authentic and the inauthentic, between true and untrue, is fascinating, as is escapism. A landscape is a venue and a space, but in a painting it is also dissociated from time and place. As for animals, it is difficult to say who they are, and it is impossible to remember people’s faces. In a painting, the strokes and the form are how things are expressed, and in that sense they are the most crucial part of the work. The subject matter alone is good for nothing. I don’t suppose it’s any different from any other medium; a work acquires its content depending on how it is written or composed, for example. The content of a painting is the result of the totality: you can’t take a single colour, brushstroke or rabbit and try to find meaning in it. They all acquire their meaning from their mutual relations.”
Anna Tuori’s ever-new, original and fascinatingly expressive work is presented at the Tampere Art Museum in an exhibition filling two floors. The show will open to the public on 19 February 2011. The Young Artist of the Year prize consists of an award of 20,000 euros, given by the City of Tampere with support from Nokia Plc., as well as a solo exhibition in the Tampere Art Museum with an attendant publication. The graphic design of the book on Anna Tuori is by Liisa Seppo.
The national Young Artist of the Year event was initiated by the Tampere Junior Chamber of Commerce in 1984. The purpose of the selection and exhibition process is to showcase young, talented artists and to draw attention to people and trends in new Finnish art. The Young Artist of the Year event is organised by the City of Tampere and the Tampere Art Museum. The Young Artist of the Year is selected by team of experts. This year’s jury was chaired by Taina Myllyharju, Director of the Tampere Art Museum, with Berndt Arell, Director of the Swedish Cultural Foundation in Finland, Janne Gallen-Kallela-Sirén, Director of the Helsinki Art Museum, and the artists Hannu Ojala, Osmo Rauhala, Katariina Salmijärvi and Janne Laine as members. The exhibition curator is Laura Köönikkä.
