hot exhibition

at äänekoski - meaning hot in centigrades, don't know otherwise. Some five of us involved and all kind of works from soap to paintings and from candies to pearls. It is just for this week when the Keitelejazz has its concerts. Spent there the last two days hanging the pictures and lusting after the beautiful long pearls, colour of mixed old rose and milkcoffee and made by Mervi Porrassalmi.

Last week we filmed for a whole day, thursday, at Kivisalmi some fifty km from here. We did some tracking shooting from a car driving round and roundand round until I felt quite sick. But it was worth the trouble: nice pictures...
And then the actors refused to understand my meaning - they just laughed and made fun of everything until they got tired. Even that was worthwhile: the dialogue runs smoothly and compactly.
Later we shot the drowning of the girl. It was windy and the water was cold, so pictures are gorgeous but the poor girl almost frose. She still shivered some two hours later.
Anyway, just a little more and then the workflow with Final cut. I have done the rough cutting all the time, but can't create the rythm before I have all the material. Seems somehow priggish, but that's just it.

windy day

and cool. I felt like going to a bikeride and then I remembered that the backtyre was in pieces. pity. Well, I should repair it, change the whole tyre. Ugh.

Otherwise I made some watercolors for the next week...

time flies

the skeleton
starring:
the cameraman
the director
the studio
and weeks pass like mellow water, not bothering but bearing on... We have been filming some and I've been skimming through the stuff several times, just cutting of the rough edges, bits and pieces. The summer around us has been warm and full of flowers, odours and hayfields. And we had a dog for a couple of days... my heart cries (and my bloodpressure goes down as it used to be), but I'm not going to have a dog, no! Tisilii, my old dog lived to be 18 years, - it is a long time to be present and responsible.
Some pictures to go with...

perseverance of the heathwave

is exhausting. I do not like heath: it is suffocating and harassing. And the thunder frightens me because it can burn the house (and all of my works, of course, and beeing a selfish and narcistic person that would be devastating), my one and only home.

The conserts are over and the market gone. Tomorrow we shall move the artexhibition to the Pawn-shop and I shall get some frames from Hankasalmi - the framedealer visitid the exhibition today.

Yesterday I had 'open doors' at the smithy. It was sweatty and i swam for the first time this summer - and not only once... And surprise surprise: my eldiest son Tuomas turned up there in the evening with his new old Mercedes. We came home together after midnight, and he left again today before noon. Such are our children, but it is good to even visit for a short while. He said he'll be back...

'The Enchantress' has been liked and praised, and here is a picture of her.

heat and exhibitions

Some hot days it has been. Yesterday I was at Laaja-art to see Improvisages, and to film them. Some really funny pictures of Ari's pictures - and the music came to tape surprisingly well. And I got pictures of Eeva-Liisa's horses as well. Captured the material in the evening and no problems with that either.

And today at ten o'clock we were building the exhibition at Konnevesi: the shoppinglists and the dragonflies went there.

I made still some more toffee - now it is finnished, the making, only selling remains. Then I had a cold shower, a glas of red wine and a cool down. - When I buildt this house, I wanted two things especially: a big window in the bathroom and a window at the kitchen where the washbasins are. It is lovely in the summer when the eveningsun shines to the bathroom...

things done and remembered

Some days ago I made the first three hundred toffees and today some four hundred more. Just a thousand to go. They are for the summerconcerts at the beach Hayrylanranta next week. For some summers I've been making them. Don't know about next year, though - but when would one know?

And today I had a visitor, who wanted to see some pictures from the great balloonflight a year ago. A warmn and calm evening it was - a bit too calm, maybe. And some three hundred pictures I took. Here are three, one to lake Keitele, the other my house and the third taken by Samuli, when I phoned him to do so: here I am in the yellow balloon!

sidesteps and lost days

A crashed dragonfly and
a poetic aquarelle.

It is so with many things as well as life itself: the little alleys and byways are much more interesting than the mainroad - or mainstream. I've been cutting our little filmfiction and as usual there are so many possibilities that it seems almost rude to choose just one. And the sound - I just don't know how to handle it - . Deep shit. But the choice is my own so who is to blame. I must be exaggerating...

So passed the midsummernight, without dreams, wide awake till morning. Alot of light and a lot of gnats.
Today my son Nasse and neighbours son Eemeli were at town Jyväskylä and a tyre blew out. So no passer-by had a suitable monkeywrench and I had to go and rescue them. Only some 50 km and back. And the spare tyre leaked too...

Not so bad on the whole...

making cards

A truly hot day. On wednesday we shall open a summershop 'Pawn' at the village Konnevesi and today some five of the local artists and artesans were furnishing and decorating the space. I sometimes think that the more people the slower everything gets done. But I'm allways hasty. So we shall continue tomorrow...

Now in the evening I've printed some new cards, two streetwievs from Helsinki and two from Jyväskylä.

thunder

Been quite a while since the last time. Because of the thunder one can't keep plugs in the sockets and that means no internet, no computer, no machines...

Been filming some three hours: our little fiction and some documentary. Sunday went in Helsinki with the crew. I've seen the material twice and it is workable. Tomorrow I'll do some rough cutting. And so on...

One problem solved

and the editing program recognizes the camera. It still won't transfer the data, but I'm working on it and perhaps some day...
It has still been cold and the wind stays in north. Yesterday I was in Jyväskylä. Got the microphone, more memory and the battery, but still no tapes. Beginnings of a crisis there.
Today I started the filming of sculptor Molsa and her horses. Quite charming wievs of meadows and horses and riding. We even made a trip with a cart drawn by the young one, Maija. It was quite exiting. Horses seem to be a lot like dogs: simple and trusting.
And tonight some more filming with the local artists.

Dipoli is new finnish architecture by Raili and Reima Pietilä.

cold for summer

Rather a cold day. I've been in the net, in the phone and using the camera and all this at the same time. There is a problem with the logging and capturing, and now I know that basically there is nothing wrong, it is only some kind on functional knot. As a matter of fact I knew that already. Well, now it has been certified after a long wait, some finnish discussion, another long wait and a longish english conversation. To put it plain: all I got was a headache.

And the virtual courses, arranging all the material to the net and hoping for the best: they will understand, and we will work on things. Yes, of course they will understand, they are clever young people. I hope that I can offer them something interesting and worth doing.

Yesterday I was at the opening of Laaja-art, artexhibition for the summer. It is allways refreshing - something new, something old too, yes. And once more it did rain....some years ago there was a mighty thunderstorm at the openings. In a way it builds quite an athmosphere...

Summertime...

when the living is easy... School is out anyway. Other jobs wait to be done. Tomorrow is the opening of Laaja-art, and I intend to go there.

school's out....

pretty soon: tidying up past years drawings and other works, giving numbers, wich is always traumatic and decorating for saturdays festivities. This is the final of one schoolyear, my eleventh, and I still feel sympathetic towards these children, their livelines and ideas. It is hard to grow in this world of rules and reasons, where your own way of shaping the reality and seeing things can be different than the mainstream's. Tolerance is important, because differences can give more than they take. I've also been scanning old pictures: seeing those people and knowing there fates and destinys feels strangely consolating. They lived and died, were happy and felt sorrow, and in these pictures they let me catch a glimpse of their world.

so sleepy...

that I've been having a nap both yesterday and today. Maybe just gone to bed so late. And working with the computer - scanning pictures and writing - is like a sleeping-pill. The machine makes a soft humming sound and your eyes begin to.....


We tried to mow the lawn with Samuli but both mowers were unreliable and whimsical so it came to maybe twenty squaremeters of short grass and we gave up the task. Then I did some cutting among the roses: the voles and the heavy snow have destroyed most rosebushes, but bits of new growth was to be seen in some roots. Yes, it feels like summer: a couple of swallows were circling the yard, looking for a place...

Tomorrow begins the last week in school and that is exhilarating.

two-day-trip

Made a visit to Helsinki. About 750 km there and back - luckily there was not much traffic either way. It did rain and it slows you down - if you have sense....

It was windy, allmost a storm, on wednesday, and that made my walk inspiring. I like wind. So I bought a book of psychology - about kids cutting themselves deliberately. Then I had a coffee and some delicacies.


Next day I had lunch with my brother and his family. And in the evening home, sweet home.

Tonight I've been scanning old fotographs, a hundred years old.

birthday

and a warm day it has been. I've been writing and arranging texts and printing and panicing: stupid me, always getting to these soups. I'm not going to explain, the history will condemn me! Anyway, the bird-cherry is in bloom and makes the air fragrant. And we had a swallow in the house. This time only for some ten minutes. A year ago it took two days to get one out. Last week there was a chaffinch in the atelier: it was calm and I took it in my hand and bye, bye little bird. We schould have nets covering the open doorways... some day, when...

installations

pure green


Day spent doing installations. No, not artistic installations - technical such. But now it seems to be in working order, the powerbook. Somehow I like it: It is a job to be done and not a nice or interesting job, no. Rather a nasty and boring and frustrating job, in wich you are bound to lose your temper... and I havent much done such jobs, so I have to read the manuals and try to understand how it schould happen. And I did understand, and it works, bloody hell!

And now in the evening I even had time for a little walk: I was almost run over by a deer! We have had here a little herd of five deer. In the autumn there were three and one of them was a little one. This was just it, the little one, grown quite a bit. It ran across the road just in front of me and stood still by some spruce just twenty meters away. And then we had a good look at each other: very nice he looked, wild and tender...

rainy day

the moped
the swans


Lazy day: I tried to sleep long, but when one is used to wake up early... I've got nothing done, just been idling away this springday... Yes, there were some swans on the field and I took some pictures of them. And of Samuli and Vile, who got the moped started and drove a little - without the seat and brakes. But it did work.


In the afternoon I had a nap and edited some pictures. It is rather cold and as it rains one can idle away with good conscience.

x

just something...