All posts by askohalme

The story of “The Devil’s Finger” of Oravais Church, Northern Finland

It is a little tricky to write just that short when its birth and destiny / treatment was a long comedy.

I designed a church building for the small town of Oravais in Northern Finland, at the end of 60´s

The building plan also included my sculpture.

The present sculptures predecessor, my small plank sculpture from 1969, had received the name of “The Devil’s Finger” from the parishioners. 

Someone saw the sculpture cut and burned. Eventually, the remainders of the Artwork were carried to the North Sea.

Saber Einar Pollars (whose venue was in the nearby village Vöyri) was interested in abstract (constructive) art and promised to build my designed steel sculpture 5 times larger than my model next to my building.

When this new sculpture was, nearly 40 years later, erected in the reformed house, it was not figurative and narrative enough. So some group considered it to be non-Christian.

They founded in 2009 a society, which only mission was to get my sculpture removed from the house that I had designed for the church. 

Eventually it was almost hidden behind the corner of the house. 

Before that, I had had conflicts round  design of the building, but I was able to make needed plans with the support of the The Finnish Heritage Agency ( https://www.museovirasto.fi/en/ )

Black Wall Gallery

Plastic art! – Black Wall Gallery Vaasa Finland 1.3-24.3.2019

Asko Halmes work at Plastic art! exhibit

This small plastic art exhibition was a refreshing experience for myself. 

Got a sudden (3 days) of material found in a random home to compose a kind of relief. 

I’ve never quite liked to the Black Wall Gallery of the Barracks area because my dark sculptures there are fading into the darkness. But this work I build on a 70×70 cent cardboard is mainly white. Small red and black surfaces and a few thin drills will enliven it.

In the open and mildly rhythmic exhibition, there were 14 people who had received 24 work. 

No longer remember when plastic has been invented, but too little has ignored other materials, and now wastes the sea as waste. 

Of the other artis in the same exhibit:

From the soft plastic was made by cutting a few spiked horizontal bars, which were fan-waved. 

Ossi Lehto introduced the plastic rationally and had brought his three small typical paintings covered with translucent plastic.

This plastic exhibition idea was the invention of YLE-TV, which is being tested in 4 cities.