Professional Faller, exhibited in Hippolyte Studio 26.11. – 19.12. 2021
video installation
audio 09:45 min, in Finnish
5 video fragments with variable durations
Professional Faller is a personal exploration of family history. It tackles the substance of memory and constructs portraiture between truth and falsehood, facts and fabulations. With an ensemble of fragmentary elements, the artist builds the image of an absent father. It involves experiences, dreams, and stories that face a partly factual, partly mysterious reality to both the viewer and author alike.
The exhibition's title comes from a story in which the artist's father, during his short religious phase, was employed as a professional faller in Christian revival meetings.
Sirpa Päivinen met her father for the first time after graduating high school. Guided by a business card, nestled between a greeting card, she finally introduced herself to a stranger behind a meat counter in a convenience store. The slow and awkward process of acquaintance opened new questions to which the artist has sought answers from her childhood memories, her father's written memoirs, and photo albums.
"My father's character is encircled by many kinds of stories. As a child I imagined him as an alcoholic who poisoned young children, a mail thief, a rich Mercedes Benz motorist, a womaniser, and kind of a con artist". Such a character who remains in the cross-sea of subjective experiences, is certainly familiar to many who wish to explore a complex family background. Päivinen's work observes the layers of human life. Yet, with intimate stories from a personal point of view, she simultaneously speaks of more general notions about remembering and the desire to understand.
The artist's work has been supported by the Arts Promotion Centre Finland and Jokes (Foundation for the Promotion of Journalistic Culture).
video installation
audio 09:45 min, in Finnish
5 video fragments with variable durations
Professional Faller is a personal exploration of family history. It tackles the substance of memory and constructs portraiture between truth and falsehood, facts and fabulations. With an ensemble of fragmentary elements, the artist builds the image of an absent father. It involves experiences, dreams, and stories that face a partly factual, partly mysterious reality to both the viewer and author alike.
The exhibition's title comes from a story in which the artist's father, during his short religious phase, was employed as a professional faller in Christian revival meetings.
Sirpa Päivinen met her father for the first time after graduating high school. Guided by a business card, nestled between a greeting card, she finally introduced herself to a stranger behind a meat counter in a convenience store. The slow and awkward process of acquaintance opened new questions to which the artist has sought answers from her childhood memories, her father's written memoirs, and photo albums.
"My father's character is encircled by many kinds of stories. As a child I imagined him as an alcoholic who poisoned young children, a mail thief, a rich Mercedes Benz motorist, a womaniser, and kind of a con artist". Such a character who remains in the cross-sea of subjective experiences, is certainly familiar to many who wish to explore a complex family background. Päivinen's work observes the layers of human life. Yet, with intimate stories from a personal point of view, she simultaneously speaks of more general notions about remembering and the desire to understand.
The artist's work has been supported by the Arts Promotion Centre Finland and Jokes (Foundation for the Promotion of Journalistic Culture).