Arja is a great photographer, excellent printer, and also a dear friend. I learnt a lot from her, and for years I have assisted her in printing her eerie, high-contrast photos. She works hard on her prints in the darkroom, having a very clear idea how the final prints should appear, so sometimes we looked like cursing witches, when with four hands we dodged and burned through the exposure under the red light. In 2012 she had a show in Marseilles, and because she was pregnant at that time, I stepped up and printed the photos for her.
Installation view of Arja Hyytiäinen / Ali Taptic at L’Atelier de visu in Marseilles, 2012
Installation view of Arja Hyytiäinen / Ali Taptic at L’Atelier de visu, Marseilles, 2012
Installation view of Arja Hyytiäinen
“The photographer Arja Hyytiäinen is a traveler. Native from the Finnish-Swedish border area, she lives between Berlin and Paris with her camera as sole companion. As a fine observer, she likes to depicher the human being. Whether she is in a small village in Moldova, or in Kreuzberg district in Berlin, she takes pictures of real lifecand does not hesitate to meet people who are on the fringes of society. She reveals spontaneous through black and white pictures. The photographer strongly believes in the decisive instant before it changes, this moment is so intense that the photographic act is similar to a scene, and his photographs seem straight out of a fiction movie. Arja Hyytiäinen works with light and darkness, and managed to create an athmosphere between silence and loneliness. The image processing in the darkroom is an important step in her creative act.” Agence Vu
©Arja Hyytiäinen
©Arja Hyytiäinen
©Arja Hyytiäinen
©Arja Hyytiäinen
