Born 1964 | Lives and works in Berlin, Germany
Ola Kolehmainen is internationally recognized for his minimalistic and abstract architectural close-ups. Now he’s working with a new series “The Art of Looking and Seeing”. The artist has been exploring numerous years museums and archives both as architectural sites and shells for collections. He is in a process of creating a memory theatre of our own time: an in-depth journey to the history of science, art, experiments and experiences. Kolehmainen presents places, spaces, people and works that open new routes into the history of Western thought.
At Makasiini Contemporary Helsinki Gallery grand opening Kolehmainen exhibits one artwork from ongoing project “The Art of Looking and Seeing”. The concept is based on the collaborative dialogue between artist Ola Kolehmainen and Dr. Susanna Pettersson, associate professor specializing in museum history and collections research, and their way to analyze both museums and works of art. One of the key elements in the project is to contextualize museums, collections and the history of art history with the aid of various themes that provide a sounding board for the encoun-ters between the works and audience. The themes include, among others, the power of knowledge, the presentation of religion, architecture as theatre and politics, and collecting as an incarnation of curiosity. Kolehmainen’s way to approach the themes emphasizes the method of looking and seeing the original art works from a new perspective. Attention to the both structure and details plays a fundamental role.
The themes of the work displayed at gallery Makasiini Contemporary Helsinki, relate to architecture as theatre and politics and power.. There has been three editions of exhibitions of the Art of Looking and Seeing: Gallery BGE, 2023 in Stavanger, Nor-way; Galerie Ruzicska, Salzburg 2023 and 2024-2025 7-month exhibition at Salon Dahlmann, The Miettinen Collection, Berlin.
