Hannaleena Heiska

About

Known for her alla prima paintings, velvety charcoal drawings, installations, performances and award-winning video works, Hannaleena Heiska’s work is characterized by a profound interest in the limits and liminality of humanity, especially in relation to other animals. She creates thematic wholes that transport their viewers into intense experiences of imagined worlds and other universes, often mirroring historical phenomena, our lived reality, and possible futures in fantastical ways. Heiska’s deep knowledge of the origins of her trade and materials is translated in her work as a unique air of timelessness – a hint to what might remain after us, or what possibly was before.

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Hannaleena Heiska (b. 1973, Oulu) graduated from the Department of Painting at the Finnish Academy of Fine Arts in 2006. She was a nominee for the biggest art prize in Finland, the Ars Fennica, in 2011. Heiska’s solo exhibitions have been seen at Turku Art Museum in 2019, and at Gothenburg Art Museum in 2015. She has also exhibited internationally, for example, at the 4th Ural Industrial Biennial, Yekaterinburg, Russia, 2017; Espace Louis Vuitton Gallery, Tokyo 2012; and the CAC – Contemporary Art Centre, Vilnius, Lithuania 2010. Heiska’s works are represented in many significant public collections, such as Gothenburg Museum of Art, Museum of Contemporary Art Kiasma, Helsinki, and EMMA – Espoo Museum of Modern Art. Her videoworks have been shown at numerous film and media-art festivals in Europe. Her film Today We Live won first prize in the Helsinki Short Film Festival in 2013.