Ritva Pirhonen - Encounterings

The original ideas of my paintings were born of encounterings and experiences during my slow walkabouts in the woods. During the last two years I immersed in working these nature experiences into paintings.

In the artistic process I shaped my memories of things I had seen by removing and adding elements. In some of my works I had quick pencil sketches to support my memory. The further I advanced in my project the more I trusted only to my visual memory and my imagination. Forest was after all my place to play and trekking already in my childhood.

I returned to the emotions and meditations of being in the forest: why was something specially imprinted in my memory? Was I feeling fear, strengthlessness, humility, remembering the impermanence of everything or something evil? When tireness was blurring the vision, difficult terrain boosted the emotions, speeded by imagination of the meager walker.

On a brisk spring morning I stand on top of a high hill and
look down into the dark spruce woods, where
a rocky and branched path is leading. I see badly. I am
sure I will tripple.
From high the only way is down. Should one therefore
aim higher?

Rugged visions bolted on the top of the mind to remind of the coarseness of life and spectrum of colors. My nature experiences and meditations on live flooded into the ambiguous and mysterious content.

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