Galerie Adler

Galerie Adler would like to introduce you to the mystic and surreal photographs of Finnish artist Susanna Majuri in her first solo exhibition in New York.

In her photographs, Susanna Majuri captures short narrative scenes as though they were film stills of a story yet to be told. Her main characters, young women mostly, their faces hidden, give a distinct impression of being lost, seeking for something they would just no find, dissolved in profound loneliness, yet somehow determined or rather resigned to this beautifully sad fate of theirs. The surrounding nature acts as complementary character, working as an emotional conduit both familiar and antagonistic. The ever changing surface of the water, once smooth as a veil of silk, once rippled though by a secret storm raging underneath, provide scenes of oscillating atmosphere ranging from quiet solitude to immediate danger. The vivid coloring of Majuri’s works the harsh contrast between bright shades of red or blue against the soft earth tones of the background mirrors her innermost feelings: "I need color to exist. I need this person, the place, the water, this touch."

With this intimate confession, Susanna Majuri creates peculiar, bizarre or even surreal atmospheres and situations for her characters. Her images are charged with what might be, ambiguous in that the viewer can only imagine that which remains outside of the frame and give the impression that we only get parts of what must be a bigger story. Susanna Majuri suggests multiple psychological and symbolically charged scenarios: “I want to show that one can find fantastic from nearby. Fiction blends into our life. The imaginary is in fact actual.”

Susanna Majuri (b. 1978, Helsinki) lives and works in Helsinki, Finland. She graduated from the Turku Arts Academy in 2004 and has an M.A. in photography from the University of Art and Design in Helsinki. The artist has had exhibitions all over Europe as in Finland, Norway, Sweden, Iceland, Germany and France. Furthermore, Susanna Majuri has won the photography prize Gras Savoye Award in Arles, France 2005 and is part of the photographic movement "Helsinki-school" together with photo-artists like Ola Kolehmainen or Miklos Gaál.