Sandra Kantanen photographs seek the essence of nature through photography, her work a commingling of photography, painting and traditional Chinese landscape art.
To create these unique pictures Kantanen prints her photographs – with similar pigments found in acrylic paint – onto aluminum plates after which she marks, smears the image – either digitally or with a brush – to create a picture that marries two traditions, two cultures and two mediums. It is a timeless aesthetic that has its roots in both Chinese art and the paintings of the great Impressionist Claude Monet who was also influenced by Eastern painting traditions.
These pictures may be of reality but their pictorial quality lies in an impression. Each photograph doesn’t look to describe what it sees rather it hopes to emanate mystery, otherness, a picture of a world that is both real and of the imagination. Here is what Kantanen has to say about her work:
In my new work I have photographed mainly landscapes, still lifes and plants. And an occasional portrait too. The title “Shadow images” refers to an old idea of Plato, that everything perceived is a shadow of the world. The objects or landscapes I photograph are of secondary importance. I work within certain traditions of image just to have a starting point for viewing. I try to state “visibility begins here”. I have been greatly inspired by artists like Björn Dawidsson, Timo Kelaranta and Hiroshi Sugimoto to name a few. They have all traced photography back to its own materiality. This is what interests me too.
As an artist I see myself as kind of a philosopher. Everyday I ask myself questions like how is the world constructed and why. Photography is basically for me an attempt to construct a language for these questions.
The new works are photographed in China, Tibet, Finland and Japan. Entering these different cultures have given me insight into very different ways of perceiving an image