• 'I’m interested in the role of the painting as an instrument, and as an active element in the performative event...
    Jussi Niva
    Free-floating (1), 2022
    oil on board
    160 x 101 x 18 cm
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    "I’m interested in the role of the painting as an instrument, and as an active element in the performative event that occurs between the viewer and the artwork.

    In the series     Free-floating, the surface of the painting has been set free to flow in movement without folding the sheet or pressing it against the wall. The size and position of the pieces corresponds with the human body: the works meet the viewer at their level."



    • Jussi Niva Free-floating (2), 2022 oil on board 160 x 99 x 22 cm
      Jussi Niva
      Free-floating (2), 2022
      oil on board
      160 x 99 x 22 cm
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    • Jussi Niva Free-floating (3), 2022 oil on board 160 x 100 x 24 cm
      Jussi Niva
      Free-floating (3), 2022
      oil on board
      160 x 100 x 24 cm
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  • 'Tones and colours in this series connect to the essences of natural materials, such as the shimmer of brass, the...
    Jussi Niva
    Free-floating (4), 2022
    oil on board
    183 x 105 x 30 cm

    "Tones and colours in this series connect to the essences of natural materials, such as the shimmer of brass, the heaviness of clay or the breathing light coming through ochre and bright yellows."

    "The three-dimensionality of the pieces is part of the agency of a painting: the works come out of the surface just enough to disturb the frontal essence of the painting and create this tension between the paintings and their viewer."


    • Jussi Niva Free-floating (5), 2022 oil on board 160 x 107 x 22 cm
      Jussi Niva
      Free-floating (5), 2022
      oil on board
      160 x 107 x 22 cm
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    • Jussi Niva Free-floating (6), 2022 oil on board 160 x 101 x 24 cm
      Jussi Niva
      Free-floating (6), 2022
      oil on board
      160 x 101 x 24 cm
      Enquire

  • Installation views
    photo: Jussi Tiainen (View more details about this item in a popup).
    photo: Jussi Tiainen (View more details about this item in a popup).
    photo: Jussi Tiainen (View more details about this item in a popup).
    photo: Jussi Tiainen (View more details about this item in a popup).
    photo: Jussi Tiainen (View more details about this item in a popup).
    photo: Jussi Tiainen (View more details about this item in a popup).
    photo: Jussi Tiainen (View more details about this item in a popup).
  • Jussi Niva
    Upthrust, 2022
    oil on board
    149 x 119 x 14 cm



    "It is typical to my works, that the viewer can find it hard to keep stationary to a single position, from which to interpret the work.

    I use the idea of the viewers motion and repeated searching for a viewing angle as a conscious interruption or disturbance in presenting the work.

    This makes the viewing situation more temporal."




  • Jussi Niva, Drift, 2022 (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Jussi Niva, from the series Float, 2022 (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Jussi Niva, from the series Float, 2022 (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Jussi Niva, from the series Float, 2022 (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Jussi Niva, from the series Float, 2022 (View more details about this item in a popup).
    Jussi Niva, Drift, 2022
  • Site-specific paintings
    Jussi Niva has explored the possibilities to modify a space even further with his arworks, and has in the past year created three large, site-specific paintings that rise from their surface folding to different directions: to Hotel Ax, for the XXVI Mänttä Art Festival and to the exhibition space at Galerie Anhava. Communicative, site-specific paintings like these can be incorporated in different spaces, from private homes to public spaces, offices and facilities.
  • Freestate, presented at the XXVI Mänttä Art Festival last summer 2022 was a three-dimensional, site-specific painting, mostly executed directly on... Freestate, presented at the XXVI Mänttä Art Festival last summer 2022 was a three-dimensional, site-specific painting, mostly executed directly on... Freestate, presented at the XXVI Mänttä Art Festival last summer 2022 was a three-dimensional, site-specific painting, mostly executed directly on... Freestate, presented at the XXVI Mänttä Art Festival last summer 2022 was a three-dimensional, site-specific painting, mostly executed directly on... Freestate, presented at the XXVI Mänttä Art Festival last summer 2022 was a three-dimensional, site-specific painting, mostly executed directly on... Freestate, presented at the XXVI Mänttä Art Festival last summer 2022 was a three-dimensional, site-specific painting, mostly executed directly on... Freestate, presented at the XXVI Mänttä Art Festival last summer 2022 was a three-dimensional, site-specific painting, mostly executed directly on...
    Freestate, presented at the XXVI Mänttä Art Festival last summer 2022 was a three-dimensional, site-specific painting, mostly executed directly on the premises. It was located in the space between two floors, in an area pierced by a stairway, and the visitors could walk around it. It transmitted to the viewer the same mimic motion, that occurs in the painting between the surface, the illusory space and the three-dimensional aspect.
     
    At one of the rooms at Hotel Ax in Helsinki, Niva created Cover, an intimate full-scale immersive experience, where the painting seems to separate from its base and come out of the ceiling and the walls of the room towards the viewer:

    "The piece functions as an intervention: it pushes into the space, and conversely also projects the space at the same time."  
    - Jussi Niva 
    photos: Jussi Niva
  • video: Oona Latto
    Jussi Niva, From Within, 2023

    As part of this exhibition, the work From within spreads itself to the corner room in Galerie Anhava, as if echoing the rythm of its angles in an accelerating pattern of folds and waves, transforming the shape of the room as well as our sense of the surrounding space.
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    video: Oona Latto

  • From the studio

     
    photo: Jussi Niva (View more details about this item in a popup).
    photo: Jussi Niva (View more details about this item in a popup).
    photo: Jussi Niva (View more details about this item in a popup).
    photo: Jussi Niva (View more details about this item in a popup).
  • Timely Remains, publication on Jussi Niva's art
    Timely Remains, 2010 Misplaced (in Yellow) on the cover, photo: Marcus Hansen

    Timely Remains

    publication on Jussi Niva's art
    The beautiful publication showcases Jussi Niva's works from the beginning of the 1990's up to the year 2010, and includes essays by Mieke Bal and Inkamaija Iitiä. 

    The book is available at the gallery  á € 20, or you can explore the PDF version  HERE.
  • JUSSI NIVA
    photo: Aleksandra Oilinki

    JUSSI NIVA

    JUSSI NIVA (b. 1966) is interested in the balance between mass and visual space. His works feature three-dimensional freely folded painted surfaces that give the impression of the surface having separated from its base and turning freely in relation to the wall and the viewer. His works are active agents in the viewing situation. Alongside painterly expression Jussi Niva’s work characteristically involves thinking about the medium of painting, its essence and form of expression, investigating the relationship of painting to space, time and place. Connections with cubism, futurism and the Japanese origami tradition can be seen in the works.

     
    Niva's works are held in several public collections, including the Museum of Contemporary Art Kiasma, EMMA Espoo Museum of Modern Art, Aine Art Museum, Sara Hildén Art Museum, Malmö Art Museum, Jenny and Antti Wihuri Foundation, and numerous private collections. He participated in the 1992 Documenta in Kassel and the 1993 Venice Biennale. He has most recently exhibited at Mänttä Art Festival (2022), Weserburg Museum für Moderne Kunst (2020); Galerie Philipp von Rosen, Cologne (2019); and Salon Dahlmann, Berlin (2018). In 2022, Niva completed a new installation, Cover, for Hotel Ax in Jätkäsaari, Helsinki.

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