Laura Pakarinen ^{Emerging artist}

Artist's country of origin: Finland

Laura Pakarinen (born 1983) is a visual artist. The core of her work is painting, but she has expanded her means of expression to stop-motion animation, installation and photography (especially analogue film and polaroids). She got her first polaroid camera in 2013, and it was love at first sight. Since then paintings and polaroids have been the key features in her artwork. Her works often depict loneliness, fears, and the feeling of being an outsider. She plays with the borders of reality and fiction. Her works are often described melancholy with a twist of humor. Sometimes they tend to have a slightly haunting or disturbing ambiance to them. At first glance everything might seem comfortingly ordinary, but after a while there might rise a feeling that things are not quite right. In her most recent works Pakarinen has explored the meaning of memory. Pakarinen lives and works in Helsinki. She graduated from Free Art School in 2011. She has had private and group exhibitions since 2008. Recent exhibitions include MFA Exhibition, Kuvan Kevät 2022, and a solo presentation at Galerie Pleiku, Berlin, Germany (Korallenmacherin, 2019), and a collaborative art piece at Exhibition Laboratory, Helsinki, Finland (Taidegrafiikan tapa olla – materiality, collaboration and agency, 2021). She is currently studying at The University of the Arts in Helsinki. GRANTS AND AWARDS
: Anita Snellman Foundation Stipend 2022, 
Kiilto’s Art Competition Award 2017,
Svenska kulturfonden 2012, 
Basware Competition for Young Art 2012, 
Art’s Council Of Uusimaa 2011. WORKS IN COLLECTION: Finnish Art Society, 
Basware Oy art collection, 
Kiilto Oy Art Collection, 
Government of Finland Art Collection. Member of the Finnish Painter’s Union
 an member of the Galleria Huuto.