Sompasaari residents enjoy new public art by Pekka Kauhanen and Heini Aho

The works will be unveiled at a public event on Friday, 20 September at 13:00. The unveiling ceremony will be held in Vinsentinaukio, after which Heini Aho will give an artist talk and a tour of her five-part artwork around Sompasaari. Arja Miller, the director of HAM Helsinki Art Museum, will unveil the works. Artist Heini Aho will be present at the event. 

Pekka Kauhanen: Flattened Fool, 2016/2024

Surrounded by a flock of small winged creatures, a figure cast in stainless steel stands by the canal fence. Flattened Fool by sculptor Pekka Kauhanen is located in Vinsentinaukio in Kalasatama. Kauhanen passed away in February 2020, and he did not see his work installed. Sculptor Matti Peltokangas, caster Arto Hyyryläinen, and visual artist Outi Pienimäki completed the installation on his behalf. 

Kauhanen was never too keen to explain the meaning behind his work and Instead, he encouraged viewers to make their own interpretations. Outi Pienimäki described Flattened Fool as “an image of a person who, even when battered by life, looks forward and sees good in the world. It is an image of faith in the sustaining power of life, an image of hope that tomorrow everything will be better”. According to Pienimäki, the work offers a warm embrace to a poor soul down of their luck. 

Pekka Kauhanen (1954–2020) was one of the most prolific sculptors and public art creators in Finland. He viewed the world with a sharp yet empathic gaze, and always with a twinkle in his eye. His original, slightly misshapen figures display magical realism and humour but also tragedy, one example being the National Memorial to the Winter War, which was installed in Helsinki in 2017. Kauhanen’s works capture a range of emotions, from happiness to sorrow and from disappointment to the power that drives us forward in life. 

Heini Aho: Washed Ashore by a Thought, 2024

Visual artist Heini Aho’s Washed Ashore by a Thought is spread among the small pier platforms surrounding Sompasaari in Kalasatama. The artist observed the atmosphere of these platforms, their characteristics, and how people use them at different times of the day and throughout the year. Based on her observations, she created five works suggesting various ways to engage with the landscape. Aho’s imaginative sculptural elements combine with texts she created in collaboration with poet Virpi Vairinen, and which have been sandblasted and engraved in the platforms.

In Breath, a shell holds small objects and is accompanied by an engraved image of bladderwrack and the line, “Ajatus kutsuu luokseen toista” (“A thought invites another”). The pier platform provides a hiding place near the water. Aho noticed that people often stand there alone, watching the sea.

Heat Reaction – The Island of the Eternal Yawn urges: “Tämän kohdan jälkeen voit haukotella” (“After this point, you may yawn”). The two sculptures on the platform indeed stretch open to a yawn. A tiger paw print reminds us of the Siberian tiger that lives in Korkeasaari zoo on the island opposite the platform.  According to Aho, this pier platform invites people to enjoy a day off, while it also serves as an empathy exercise: where is the line between catching a yawn and spreading them?

In Elevating, a palm holds a shell. The Finnish line “aallon laella haahka kahlaa vaahto haihtuu aava vaihtuu” (“on the crest of the wave, an eider wades, foam dissipates, a sea change”) plays phonetically and visually with the back-and-forth, up-and-down movement of the sound and the sea waves. The rippling text also recalls the form of the bridges cutting through the view. The open hand and the shell are symbols of hearing and listening to the environment.

Energy Islet – Monument to Carbon Black comprises of the charred remains of logs engraved with the colour code for carbon black (0,0,0) and the words “lempifossiili”, “arkimusta”, and “pilvimaali” (“favourite fossil”, “everyday black”, and “cloud paint”). The coal pile of the opposite power plant was cleared away during the work’s creation process. “The monument approaches the coal pile with warmth and love, considering that coal as a source of energy is being phased out: as a source of energy, it is a fossil. The monument pays tribute to the various shades of black and carbon’s enormous significance for life on Earth,” Aho says.

Little Hylkysaari Island toys with the idea of an urban recycling and lost-and-found station. It refers to the nearby Hylkysaari – Shipwreck Island in English – and the treasures washed up by the sea. The work includes imprints of objects and texts classifying those objects in a way that deviates from the usual scientific logic, such as “invisible ones”, “composed of dots and lines”, “wish-fulfilling”, and “to be thrown”. Little Hylkysaari Island prompts reflection on what is left behind, what is lost, and what is found.

Heini Aho (b. 1979, Turku) combines elements of sculpture, installation, and moving image into works addressing issues of space and perceptions of the environment. In her works, she approaches phenomena, characteristics of material, and immateriality both analytically and intuitively. Her works often include a subtly light-hearted tone; be it a touch of humour, an element of joie de vivre, or an elating feeling of freedom in the face of ordinary matters. Aho graduated from the Finnish Academy of Fine Arts in 2015 and the Turku Academy of Arts in 2003. She was awarded the William Thuring Foundation’s main prize in 2016. 

The works, curated by HAM, will be added to the City of Helsinki’s art collection. The acquisitions have been enabled by the City of Helsinki’s Percent for Art policy, which was implemented in the construction of Kalasatama. New permanent and temporary art and events are commissioned as part of the Kalasatama Environmental Art Project and executed in collaboration with the City Executive Office, Urban Environment Division, Culture and Leisure Division, and HAM Helsinki Art Museum. Public art is funded with a tariff collected from the construction companies and developers of the area.