Market Art Fair

Shifting Perspectives: Heini Aho & Päivi Takala at Market Art Fair 2025

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Photo by Heikki Räisänen. Courtesy of Galerie Anhava and Heini Aho.

Galerie Anhava presents a duo exhibition where Aho’s spatial explorations and Takala’s contemplative paintings invite us to slow down and see the everyday anew.

For Market Art Fair 2025, Galerie Anhava presents a duo exhibition featuring Finnish artists Heini Aho and Päivi Takala, whose works explore quiet transformations that alter our perception of the everyday. Their art invites a slower pace – where a slight shift in perspective or a subtle change in perception can set thoughts, emotions, and ideas in motion.

In Heini Aho’s works, the analytical meets the intuitive, and the material meets the immaterial. Aho’s method is based on observing the ordinary and the characteristics of the material, with a subtly light-hearted tone – a touch of humour, wonderment, joie de vivre, or surprise. In her works, she combines elements of sculpture, installation, and the moving image to address issues of space and perceptions of the environment.

  • Photo by Heikki Räisänen. Courtesy of Galerie Anhava and Heini Aho.
  • Photo by Jussi Tiainen. Courtesy of Galerie Anhava and Heini Aho.

Aho’s explorations of space and materiality find a compelling counterpoint in Päivi Takala’s contemplative paintings, which examine the complex relationship between humans and nature.

With a critical yet gentle eye and soft brushstrokes, Päivi Takala observes and contemplates the human way of being with other living things. Her paintings pose a question: how can one portray both the human tendency to dominate and exploit natural beings and the eternal longing to be touched by nature? The pale, faded palette of the paintings is a nod to the early Renaissance frescoes, to which Takala returns time and time again.

  • Photo Aleksandra Oilinki. Courtesy of Galerie Anhava and the artist.
  • Photo by Jussi Tiainen. Courtesy of Galerie Anhava and the artist.
  • Photo by Jussi Tiainen. Courtesy of Galerie Anhava and the artist.

Both Aho’s observant sculptures and Takala’s meticulous paintings share an analytical yet tender approach – rooted in a sense of wonder and a contemplative curiosity about the world we live in.

About the gallery