Jukka Virkkunen

The studio is an arena. 

Painting is physical. 

I work with un-stretched canvases that are larger than my physical self or the arena I make paintings in. Twisting and folding the canvas leaves marks of this process on the painting. The manipulation of material is evident on the surface of the finished work. 

The history of the material is as important as the colours chosen and the surfaces produced. All matter has inherent meaning in its essence. I respect how each material behaves and wants to exist within a painting. I pair paints that offer a juxtaposition of immediate and sedative techniques–like those deployed with oil and then spray-paint. These moves create an atmosphere that reveals itself over time.

The physicality of the gesture must be evident. 

Victory arrives in a direct line that emanates from my subconscious to my arm. 

I currently explore emptiness and time trough minimal mark-making on monumental monochrome canvases. I create my own architecture—a volume of colour held inside a space or over existing structures. 

Specific locations have been a source of the conceptual framework for the series. Ecumenical prayer rooms in airports, contemporary Nordic churches, and the traditional wooden saunas of my native Finland are all places of silence and contemplation. They all bear an emptiness that’s filled with marks of the human bodies that have passed through them.