Interview: Sini Majuri
Luca Curci talks with Sini Majuri during CANVAS INTERNATIONAL ART FAIR 2022, at THE ROOM – Contemporary Art Space.

Helsinki based glass artist Sini Majuri (Master of Arts) is awarded with multiple design awards, such as Golden A’Design Award from Italy – where she has also been invited three times as the Grand Jury member. Her glass sculptures have appeared in over 70 exhibitions in New York, Tokyo, New Mexico, Toronto, Venice and Hong Kong. Majuri often combines glass with 3D design and comic strip influenced expression. Her art has been featured in various international publications, for example in magazines such as Designboom, Elle and Urban Glass.

Luca Curci – What is art for you?
Sini Majuri – In this twisted era of War and insecurity, artists have a responsibility in capturing the nature of the time. I believe that Art is programmed deep into human heredity. As a glass artist I see craftsmanship; creating by hands, as a vital part of my art. The profound importance of craftsmanship sparks in our primitive instincts. It’s clicking in the Stone Age tools, step by step towards civilization. We have originally shaped our security, construction, innovation and creation with our hands. Therefore art has always been connected deeply in humanity. Art opens when it interacts. It is a form of communication that has retained the character of mystery throughout time. It’s a universal language. The language of beauty and spirituality. Even dangerous language. And it must be dangerous, because it always reveals our true essence. 

LC – Do you have any habits or rituals while you work?
SM – I believe that my work ritual is quite universal; singing terrible eighties ballads while making objects. I work in Glass Studio Hytti, located in the UNESCO World Heritage Site, Suomenlinna island. The ferry ride from Helsinki’s noisy soundscape across the sea is meditative: like a transition to a state of creation. In winter, the island is very quiet. Therefore no audience for the creative rituals. I believe that glass blowing has a sense of ritual at its core. It’s a sensitive process with an elemental matter that behaves like hot lava. The movements of the process flow from the spinal cord. It’s a startling, sweaty and stained by smoke ritual. The moment when a mouth blown object is eventually used, has ritualistic aspects of respect and calmness.

LC – How is being an artist nowadays?
SM – Being an artist has always had its challenges. Pandemics had a major impact on the creative sector. However it forced artists to think fresh and also find new ways to cooperate and interact. Finding one’s own professional family is important. In the artist’s work, it is rare, but especially significant, to receive genuine feedback in a safe environment.

LC – Do you use art to express something in particular? Is it your medium of expression?
SM – Glass is an expressive material that reaches the invisible layers of existence. As a contrast to its sensuality, glass is one of the key technologies that have shaped the modern World. It allowed us to discover the microscopic World as well as the distance of Space. It has magic and primordiality. History. Unknown. My Family Portrait sculpture series reflects the delicate and multidimensional whole of the human mind. The portraits are balancing on the border of beauty and monstrousness – aiming to mirror how the moments of encountering and seeing a person have changed radically during the pandemic. Faces are distorted, death is hidden behind the herringbone parquets, and the ciphers are tied to the shadows of the objects. Woman is a recurring theme in the sculptures: How she has been portrayed in culture throughout the millennia. Especially in the myths such as Eve and Pandora, an active and curious woman is the root of all evil. Lilith, the World’s first woman that sees herself as equal to man is demonized as well as strong matriarch Louhi from Kalevala myths. I often reflect these distant echoes of mythological women in the sculptures. At the same time, the sculptures are images of saints, movie stars and selfies tangled together with real life women. In the sculptures faces are waving, when viewed from the side, the eyes multiply. At the same time, a person is under water or in an old-fashioned picture frame, inside a futuristic cell like mass. Series reflect how our own perspective affects how we see each other. It’s always blurred by the time and culture. There are always hidden layers in us all.

LC – What do you think about the concept of this exhibition? How did it inspire you?
SM – I was most inspired about the concept of mixing identities. Particularly what interests me is how a human identity is distorted. Society can crack an individual’s shell, turning shards into something desired. It’s startling how deep rooted these structures are and how blind we are in the end to see ourselves. The moments we set out to look at each other from a new perspective are rare. Identity is a living thing. It needs to be mixed, that’s a way to evolve.

LC – Do you think ITSLIQUID GROUP can represent an opportunity for artists?
SM – The visibility and networking always have challenges in the hybrid aeon, therefore new structures and innovative approaches are needed. Cultural events bring the sense of security and normal into the chaotic world, as they also offer the arena for communication on a deeper level.