Abb.: Juha Sääski: In the Street 11, 2024, oil on canvas, 40 x 50 cm

Juha Sääski’s works explore feelings of security on the one hand and vulnerability on the other; he contrasts experiences of imminent danger with positive everyday occurrences.

Life goes on in a world full of discouraging and terrible events. Due to the media deluge, we constantly feel as though we are in the midst of disasters, even though, for the moment at least, we are not physically threatened. To express the paradoxical nature of human life, Sääski juxtaposes comical and naïve elements with serious content. In a famous dictum by Charlie Chaplin, life is a tragedy when viewed up close, but a comedy from a distance (‘life is a tragedy in close-up, but a comedy in long-shot’).

The works of the Finnish artist Juha Sääski have already been shown in a number of solo and group exhibitions in Germany, for example in Berlin, Nuremberg, Ulm, Munich, Mannheim, Viernheim (Kunsthaus & Kunstverein Viernheim) and Koblenz (Museum Ludwig).