Page 176 - ART NOW Internationally Recognized Artists

It is truly a singular pleasure to be opening an exhibition
art now Finnish National Gallery, I have mostly been attending digital
in actual physical space. As a member of the Board of the

openings since the spring.
Riitta is, in many ways, a very special artist. I am fortunate
not to have to resort to comparisons here to extol her
extraordinariness. Personal experience and commitment
are always the best proof. My own collection and those of
the companies I manage include more than twenty works by
Riitta from different stages, in different materials, and from
different points in her long career. At home, my living room

wall is adorned with the very same tapestry that hung in my
childhood bedroom, in a new arrangement and a new place,
but with the same meanings.
Riitta has been a very important mentor for my journey into
the world of visual art. Art already became a very natural part
– not just of festive but also – of everyday life and existence
in my childhood years, and I have subsequently carried on
that same development as a collector.
Riitta does not take art too solemnly. Finnish is rich on this
point: serious and solemn are two different things. Taking
things solemnly is always a bad sign, taking things seriously

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art now