Aaron Hiltunen is a long-standing Turku painter born in Karjala (1926 in Salmi). He is an original, explosively bold expressionist, who deserves to be much better known than he is. We are proud to get to curate an exhibition of his broad oeuvre at the Critical Gallery.
The exhibition has been curated by the painter Susanna Vuorio, one of the founding members of the Critical Gallery:
“When I first found out about Aaron Hiltunen’s work – thanks to the late Erkki Pirtola – it blew my mind. What, who has done this?!
For the exhibition at the Critical Gallery, I chose paintings of people and subjects that deal with societal issues. I was especially impressed by the paintings depicting motherhood in Karelia. They got personally close to me, literally to my roots, as we have family roots in the same area of Karelia.
He has started painting in the 50s and 60s, first as a sideline to his main job. In the early times he was painting and drawing very sporadically, but he’s always put his whole essence to it, making no compromises and with an apparent great passion.”
Hiltunen didn’t get to concentrate on painting full-time until the 1980s when he retired from his job at the State Railways. A multi-faceted flood of paintings was born as a result. He has been painting works based on both perception and imagination. In some of his paintings he takes a firm stand on political issues, while in some others he plunges into interpreting the myths of Kalevala, for example. Painting, clearly, has been to him a holistic way of dealing with things. By painting, he ponders about what’s going on around him, the past and the future, and holds a mirror to what is happening not only in his own life but in society.
Hiltunen’s art is born out of a wonderful combination of natural talent and skill acquired by rigorous practice. We believe his exhibition at the Critical Gallery will bring lots of joy to the public – and work as a great inspiration to painters younger than him.
Aaron Hiltunen’s paintings are a valuable continuation to a long tradition. For example Ernst Ludwig Kirchner (1880–1938), Chaim Soutine (1893–1943), Karl Schmidt-Rottluff (1884–1976), Tyko Sallinen (1879–1955) and Yrjö Saarinen (1899–1958) are classics known by many.
Expressionism has sometimes been in fashion, sometimes not, but it has always had eager practitioners who have continued working even when they got no recognition. For example Maria Lassnig (1919–2014), Alice Neel (1900–1984) and Miriam Cahn (1949–) were not recognized until advanced age – and now they have the status of a classic.
It is, thus, never too late: come and see the miracles of Aaron!
