News

Art Center Ahjo, Kytö/Liekki space: Simo Kontio

Simo Kontio – All is Not Lost
Art Center Ahjo, Kytö/Liekki space
1.6. - 19.6. 2022

All is Not Lost exhibition consists of drawings completed in Finland and Canada between 2019-2022. During the completion of the works the world has faced several major challenges: an accelerating climate crisis, a global pandemic and war. A tragedy in the artist’s family brought distress also to a personal level. The exhibition explores through drawings what is powerlessness in the midst of adversity - how to maintain hope?

Simo Kontio has reduced his expression to drawings on paper. Detailed and patiently finished pencil and wooden crayon drawings contain recognizable elements but the textured surfaces and shapes distance the viewer from a sense of familiarity.

The themes of the exhibition are intertwined in the drawings where nature and the fragility of the human body are harmoniously equated. The theme of the exhibition is to defragment and accept even heavy subjects through art. Big threats are concretized on paper in an aesthetic form that brings hope that everything will be all right.