Minkkinen Celebrates Exhibits, Books and Lectures

Minkkinen's Book "Homework" shows 30 years of photography taken in his homeland of Finland.

Professor Minkkinen’s photographs have been featured recently in six exhibitions around the world: in France, Finland, Italy, China, and two shows in the USA. An exhibition of small works this April at Galerie Agathe Gaillard in Paris was followed by a show of larger works at Fay Gold Gallery in Atlanta and Galerie Anhava in Helsinki. Concurrent with these venues was a major retrospective at the Palazzo Principi in Correggio, Italy, the continuation of the SAGA touring show seen here at the DeCordova Museum and Sculpture Park in 2005.  SAGA moves to the Winnipeg Gallery of Art in Canada this fall after tours in Romania, Slovakia, Finland and Italy.

A fifth exhibition—a 50 print version of the SAGA retrospective—is currently on view in China at the new See+ Art Space Gallery in the famous Dashanzi 798 Art District. Opening July 1, 2008, Minkkinen’s works will also be on two-year display at Cavallo Point in San Francisco, the new lodge at the Golden Gate National Park.

Linked to three of these shows are three books that have just been published. Homework: The Finnish Photographs of Arno Rafael Minkkinen, 1973 to 2008 (Like Publishing Ltd., Helsinki, 2008) concentrates on photographs taken in his homeland. The 168-page, hardcover includes an essay covering his mother’s childhood in pre-war Finland, his childhood in Helsinki as well as his family’s immigration to America in 1951. Another section titled “What I Learned from My Teachers” reveals how 19th century Finnish painters influenced his art. In turn, Minkkinen acknowledges now-famous Finnish photographers who were once in his classrooms in “What I Learned from My Students”.

A second book, titled SAGA (Flying Dragon Enterprises, Shenzhen, 2008) was issued for the opening of the Beijing exhibition. The Chinese/English book is a portable version of the larger monograph published by Chronicle Books in 2005.

The third monograph, Swimming in the Air, is a 60-page hardcover published by Cavallo Point in San Francisco. The book features a sequence of images that goes around the world: from New England to Sweden, Norway, Finland, England, France, Italy, and Malta across to China and Japan, ending up back via the West Coast in New England. The book is one of 20 books being published by Cavallo Point representing many of the works that are on display in spas, guest rooms and activity centers at “The Lodge at Golden Gate.”

In addition to his books and exhibits, Professor Minkkinen has delivered five lectures in the past half year: in Finland, Atlanta, Italy, Boston, and China during a week-long workshop for Finnish and Chinese students on Hainan Island last December. Professor Minkkinen will be out of the classroom on sabbatical for the Fall 2008 semester but will be conducting a special seminar for advanced photo students.