Helsinki
In “Introspective” (on view through March 8, 2026), Antti Oikarinen contemplates the nature of artistry, the inspiration and personal methodology that drive him to develop his ideas, and the emergence of meaning. Given that this remarkable exhibition celebrates the Finnish Art Society’s 180th anniversary, its focus couldn’t be more relevant, and the richly varied works on view demonstrate how Oikarinen’s deliberations generate multiple perspectives that lead viewers to consider and reconsider the creative process and the act of looking at art.
Untitled (2022) and Explanation (2025), textual excerpts addressing the vicissitudes of art’s legibility and the nature of content, and White Sculpture (2024), an expansive monochrome floor installation made of painted MDF elements that may delineate the convergence or dispersal of ideas, showcase the range of Oikarinen’s project. A central ensemble consisting of a book and a picture frame set on a chair anchors White Sculpture, which then fans out to include serviceable tools, such as a paintbrush, roller, and open cans of paint. Beyond them, unfamiliar items create a diffuse, halo-like array. Then there is Colours (2025), a contradictory set of five deftly shaded graphite drawings portraying selected hues in corresponding shades of gray.
Partway through the show, viewers may start to feel that they are not getting the point of the work. Introspection, after all, is a process that we assume will expedite understanding and produce a modicum of clarity by providing an answer or two. But that kind of insight doesn’t seem to happen here: even though Oikarinen’s works depict recognizable subjects and come with simple, apparently descriptive titles, they are consummately cryptic. Rather than provide easy answers, they urge us to ruminate on ideas, questioning what can be seen, the nature of material reality, and the aim of a configuration and its potential affiliations. Suddenly, the act of looking at art is converted into an investigation, the viewer transformed into an analyst operating within an unusual research center.
Consider Painting and Sculpture (2025), a work that pairs what appear to be identical paintings—though one is carved marble. It’s not enough that the naked eye fails to identify differences between the two surfaces; Oikarinen’s working methods also defy explanation. Clay (2025), in contrast, looks like a work in progress. Two small, irregular blocks of wet clay are stacked on a plywood shelf, apparently waiting to be shaped into form. But the odor of wet clay is absent, and the label lists the materials as acrylic paint, bronze, and plywood. In truth, this is a finished sculpture that also contains its previous, unfinished state.
Such sleight of hand also applies to how painting can be sculpture and sculpture can be painting—another question that fascinates Oikarinen. The large canvas in Guest (2025) is supported by seven spindle legs that serve to push it out from the wall and lift it up off the floor. As the exhibition guide notes, it is one of four works that Oikarinen created while imagining he was a slightly different person. It is an interesting idea and a daring experiment. The humorous Introvert (2025) is clearer. Configured as a slender and semi-freestanding oval, its verso/tacking margin represents its public face, whereas the picture plane shies away, in effect, by facing inward. Its cousin, the much larger Sculptural Form (2025), stands as a compelling variation. From a distance, this wonky open wooden frame seems just that, but as it leans against a wall—a position that helps camouflage its true nature—we glimpse its back and discover that it, too, is a work on canvas.
The masterful The Making of the Work “The Undefined Takes Shape” (2024) may be the most pertinent work in this presentation. Featuring a miscellany of unpainted wooden forms laid out on ersatz metal sawhorses, it projects the artist’s predicament, exemplifying and condensing the intellectual struggles, practical dilemmas, and attendant moments of joy that arise when things come together. In that regard, it refers not only to Oikarinen’s practice, but to the practices of very many, if not all, artists.
Exploring “Introspective,” I sensed links to Erwin Wurm’s humor, Myron Stout’s deceptively uncomplicated graphite drawings, and Martin Puryear’s skillful way of handling wood and producing works that thwart interpretation. Then I saw Composition (2025), a set of three portraits, featuring the logician and philosopher Kurt Gödel, the painter Agnes Martin, and the Russian avant-gardist and absurdist poet Daniil Harms. Do they represent Oikarinen’s prime influences or personify his artistic temperament? It’s something else to consider.
