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Saturday, June 15, 2013

Rozsa Gallery hosts Five Contemporary Finnish-American Artists exhibit to help celebrate FinnFest

HOUGHTON -- Five Contemporary Finnish-American Artists is the current exhibition at the Rosza Gallery located in the Rozsa Performing Arts Center at Michigan Tech. The five Finnish-American artists from Maine to Minnesota have brought or sent their work to help celebrate FinnFest. The exhibit, which opened this week, is free and open to the public through June 23.

Chris Koivisto's "transformations of forests and sounds" installation is part of the exhibit Five Contemporary Finnish-American Artists, now displayed in the Rozsa Gallery and continuing through June 23. (Photo courtesy Copper Country Community Arts Center)

Chris Koivisto, a ceramic and bronze sculptor from near Ely, Minnesota, has installed bronze cast wild animal heads on specially constructed walls depicting the forest, as well as traditional pottery inspired by the north woods, lakes and rivers. He calls this work "transformations of forests and sounds."

Marlene Ekola Gerberick lives and makes her art in Bath, Maine. Her installation of paintings titled "Six Pouches and One Feather" features quiet still life renderings of single objects. She is also a poet and will have her latest book, Of Ghosts Deep in Memory, published by the Siirtolaisus Instituuti of Turku. Finland.

John Lundeen lives near Munising, in a beautiful house attached to the side of a cliff over Lake Superior. His paintings reflect a fascination with the workings of nature and symbols of communication. They are inspired by the strong horizon, the storms, clouds, and images he sees every day, providing a base for him to depart into a world of vision and metaphor.

Marlene Wisuri's studio is also on Lake Superior, near Duluth, Minnesota. She is best known for her photography, but this work is an homage to her parents. Paper constructions are made from the saved documents -- checks, financial statements, etc. -- which she discovered after her mother died. She uses geometric patterns referencing the art of quilting for the formal design elements of the pieces.

Three paintings by Kayleen Ylitalo Horsma are part of a body of work sharing her Finnish ethnicity and culture, made possible by a grant from the McKnight Foundation in Minneapolis, which provides funding for exceptional artists to create new work.

This exhibition is in conjunction with FinnFest USA 2013 and is on display through June 23. It is free and open to the public during the Rozsa Center's regular business hours. The public is invited to a reception from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. on Saturday, June 22. The Rozsa Gallery is located on the lower level of the Rozsa Center.

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