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 Currently Exhibiting at:
Jubilee Sacred Art & Artifacts Gallery
520 Broadway
in Sonoma, California
until May 31, 2008
Call 707.933.8267 for more information
ABOUT HELENA TIAINEN:
Helena was born and raised in Helsinki, Finland and arrived in the United States in August 1979 to attend the San Francisco Art Institute. In December 1982 she graduated from the SFAI with a BFA major in painting and drawing and minor in printmaking. Helena currently lives and works in Berkeley, California. She is self-employed and an active artist. Besides fine arts she also does freelance illustration and graphic design.
Helena has participated in many group and solo exhibitions and has also been an active member in planning and making art events happen. Helena is a member of the Nordic5Arts of the Bay Area. http://www.nordic5arts.com/artists/tiainen_helena/tiainen_helena.html . Her art is collected by individuals internationally.
Helena accepts art commissions that fit her style, price range and media. All of her original paintings and drawings are one of a kind unique creations created with high quality materials. None are copies or replicas. You can order prints on paper and greeting cards created from photographs and scans of these paintings and drawings in small custom order editions. For commercial licensing purposes contact ArtVisions at http://www.artvisions.com/notecards/notecards-tiainen.htm. You can contact Helena directly regarding buying or commissioning original art by clicking on the "Contact" option or from the "Commissions" page on the left hand side of this screen.
ABOUT BEING AN ARTIST:
Helena's artwork is mainly about the joy and mystery and wonder of the world and the universe we live in. She deals with both inner and outer realities and sees her paintings as both abstract and representational.
Helena does not feel like she really fits into any particular existing category. Her work is unique and is not currently part of any art movement or trend. She sees her paintings as having surreal, representative, symbolic, decorative, abstract and contemporary elements in them. Whether simplified or plentiful, patterns and repetition create strong movement and flow in her work. Her paintings and drawings deal mainly with universal concepts and are based on her perceptions of life and the nature of reality.
For Helena being an artist is an adventure. She is very inspired to make something that did not exist before she made it out of raw materials. When painting she feels like she is in touch with the primordial forces.
ABOUT SUBJECT MATTER, PROCESS, INSPIRATION AND CHOSEN MEDIA:
Helena often paints and draws what are usually considered beautiful and delicate sides of life. But the forms in her paintings and drawings are also often metaphors and represent ways that she as a human being relates to the world and the cosmos at large. Helena chooses forms and colors that hold meaning and feeling to her and she paints and draws that which has an impact on her. She likes to delve deep into the spirit of her subject matter as she consciously and subconsciously perceives it. Helena trusts her feelings and ideas/cues that come to her while painting and drawing and follows them in making choices on the canvas and paper. Often these choices are so fast that there is no real analytic thinking process involved. In order to see what needs to be changed she needs to step back and take a good look at the whole picture. The process of painting and drawing has taught Helena much about the process of life itself. Helena enjoys the dialogue she has with her art.
What really calls out for Helena artistically is the mysterious, the radiant, the mainly unseen and the intimate in the every day as well as in the so called peak experiences. She is very attracted to beauty and balance and some of her work has humorous aspects to it. Her orientation in life as well as in art is mainly spiritual and sensual with intellect playing a supportive but very important role. Her greatest muse is the nature and her own imagination but she has also been very influenced by many artists that came before her. Among these artists are Georgia O'Keeffe, Mark Rothko, African, Aboriginal and Native American Primitive and Tribal Art, Kandinsky, Malevich, Paul Klee and Henri Matisse. Of Finnish artists her greatest influence has been Gallen-Kallela. Helena is constantly inspired by her surroundings and experiences, both familiar and new. She feels like she has her feet firmly planted on the ground with her head in the stars. She believes that one cannot take the artist out of their art. If the artist is honest with themselves the product they produce is very much a reflection of them and the unique way that they experience life in a human form. At its highest level this experience becomes universal and many others can identify with the artist's experience or have the art open up new possibilities of seeing and being for them.
There are times that Helena is inspired to paint or draw from real life/models but more often she paints and draws from her memory, feelings and imagination and almost certainly in any of her work she has at some point gone into using material from her inner reality. She likes to paint with water media, acrylics and watercolors, because of the spontaneity and flow that these allow.
In some of Helena's paintings there is a center panel within the painting. This represents to her the inner experience or that which is being focused on. The areas around the center panel are representative of the bigger picture, of all that could and may surround the focus point. In human experience there is always that which is clearly being focused on and that which becomes the background. Our eyes and mind act like mirrors that we view the world thru. These aspects are very important in Helena's center panel paintings and in her art in general.
Helena also likes to push her limits and experiment with new media and different ways of using a familiar one. Her folded canvas and mixed media sculptural paintings are a good example of this. In her folded canvas paintings she manipulates cut pieces of canvas to create folded 3-D forms that are attached on the stretched canvas or canvas board with acrylic mediums and later painted with acrylics. In her mixed media paintings she uses anything from beads to found/recycled objects and acrylic paints and mediums to create the desired results.
ABOUT ARTISTIC PURPOSE:
Helena states that art to her is continuous exploration of both the unknown and the so called familiar. It is an attempt to see with an open heart. She feels that all art aims at capturing a glimpse of the essential nature of that which is being observed and experienced. To her making art is also play and she often gets joy out of the act of painting. It is Helena's intention to glorify life and living and the joy of seeing with her paintings. She also hopes to bring wonder and pleasure to others thru her creations.
Helena Tiainen welcomes all inquiries concerning her work. You can contact her via this web site.
Helena holds all rights to her art. Copyright laws are in effect. DO NOT USE ANY IMAGES ON THIS SITE WITHOUT WRITTEN PERMISSION FROM THE ARTIST.
For commercial licensing purposes Helena is represented by ArtVisions Licensing Co. at http://www.artvisions.com/notecards/notecards-tiainen.htm
HELENA TIAINEN ART RESUME:
SELECTED SOLO EXHIBITIONS SINCE 2002:
COLOR COLOR, the salon, "Eight Selected Paintings", Novato, October thru December 2005
FBCA Signature Gallery, "Perceptions", Alameda, August 2005. Curator: Debra Owen
Park Chow Restaurant, San Francisco, October 2004 thru January 2005. Curator: Colleen Christie-Putnam
Park Chow Restaurant, San Francisco, October 2003 thru January 2004. Curator: Colleen Christie-Putnam
Crocker Galleria, San Francisco, September 2002. Curator: ArtMatch
SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS SINCE 1997:
TOUCH, "Selected Art", Oakland, January thru February 2008
Bobby G's Pizzeria Restaurant, "Art by Selected Local Artists: A Rotating Group Exhibit", Berkeley, May 2007 thru January 2008
The Addison Street Windows Gallery, Nordic 5 Arts: "Nordic Mysteries", Berkeley, October thru November 2007
Frank Bette Center for the Arts, "Best Seller's Showcase", Alameda, October 2007
MC Art Works Gallery, Group Exhibit and Sale, El Cerrito, September thru October 2007
Theatre 39, "4x4 Art Exhibit", San Francisco, December 2006 thru May 2007
UFKB&S #21, "Arts and Crafts at the Kaleva Hall: Exhibit and Sale", Berkeley, November 2006
Frank Bette Center for the Arts, "Best Sellers Showcase - Celebrating Creativity!", Alameda, October 2006
Finnish Kaleva Hall, "FinnArt", Berkeley, May 2006
WoW!Art Gallery, "Cats and Fish Art Show", Oakland, May 2006
Creative Effects, Group Exhibit and Sale, Oakland, February 2006
Frank Bette Center for the Arts, "Best Sellers' Showcase", Alameda, October 2005
Finnish Kaleva Hall, "FinnArt", Berkeley, May 2005
Finnish Kaleva Hall, "FinnArt", Berkeley, May 2004
Frank Bette Center for the Arts, "Earth and the Cosmos", Alameda, April 2004
Pro Arts Gallery, "Open Studios", Oakland, April thru June 2004
Pro Arts Gallery, "Open Studios", Oakland, May thru June 1997 - 2002
SELECTED PUBLICATIONS AND REVIEWS:
Nordic 5 Arts Exhibit Catalog: "Nordic Mysteries", October 19 - November 28, 2007, by Helene Sobol, www.nordic5arts.com
San Fran Voice, http://www.sanfranvoice.com/sf-art-speaks-an-interview-with-helena-tiainen/, "SF Art Speaks: An Interview with Helena Tiainen", May 14, 2007
Painterskeys.com Community Newsletter, selected responses to articles published, 2003-2008
Bayarts News, http://bayart-news.livejournal.com/17390.html, article, "Helena Tiainen", April 23, 2006
Raivaaja, review/interview, "Helena Tiainen stages San Francisco art show", November 17, 2004
Finlandia Foundation Newsletter, review, "Show of paintings by Helena Tiainen", November 2004
Amerikan Uutiset, review, "Helena Tiainen's Works in San Francisco" by Harri Siitonen, November 2004
New World Finn, article, "Helena Tiainen Shows Paintings in San Francisco" by Harri Siitonen, December 2003
RELATED FIELD EXPERIENCE:
Illustration (including "Breakfast for the Family", a book by Susan Carpenter, 1991) and Freelance Graphic Arts and Design, since 1986. Private Art Tutoring. Interior Design and Redesign.
EDUCATION:
Bachelor of Fine Arts, San Francisco Art Institute, 1982
REPRESENTED BY:
ArtVisions at http://www.artvisions.com/notecards/notecards-tiainen.htm
Yessy On-line Art Gallery at http://www.yessy.com/HelenaTiainen/bio.html
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