Finland - A Past Presence

Images from my adopted home

These works were created for the exhibition at the Rachmaninov Gallery in St. Petersburg in the spring of 2009. Although I am not Finnish by birth, my 15 years of living here has brought me to the point where things that at one time were exotic to me are now quite normal. That is to say I see the Finnish people in much the same way they see themselves and I am sometimes able to enter the intimacy of a moment and capture it without disturbing the delicate balance.

A people and their land

While selecting the images for this exhibition I became aware of something in the Finnish character that was as evident in their landscapes as it was in their personalities. The ability to exist comfortably in isolation, even while in the presence of others.