I work for nature

Writer: Otso Kantokorpi

…Instead of monumental sculpture, he mainly works in small scale, and in wood. … “Since it had a call when I chose it, I am a builder rather than someone who removes; I think it has to do with my background as a painter. Wood provides an opportunity for this.”

Hirvimäki’s present shamanistic visual world is full of mythological animals of strength, such as wolf, but there are also snakes, dragonflies, bears and many things that are hard to name. And even his relationship with wolf is not very simple. I recall a wolf piece by him that was made with ten different species of wood: pine, spruce, birch, bird cherry, cherry wood, oak, lime, poplar, beech and apple wood.

For Hirvimäki, wood is both nature and culture: “the forest is a shrine. I can still sense the wooden floor of childhood under my bare feet.”