1. The painting is here a room. The painting is in the room. A woman is in the room that is in the painting. The woman has painted her mouth closed with red paint. All this must surely be past time but I think: The unhappier she is, the more she decorates herself, in the broadest sense of the decorations.

2. The woman is in a coffin. The coffin is in the room. The room is in the painting that is in the room. The room is somewhere in this world. The coffin is closed with decoration. The room is closed with decoration. The world is a room closed with decoration.

I have tried to combine private and public in my paintings. I look inside and outside. We live in a common reality through our own individual experience of the world. One can choose any place or phenomenon in the world that one can find as an interesting example of what is taking place in the world. I paint the familiar environment and people I know through my own experiences and emotions. On the other hand, I paint the distant, unknown, and chaotic world and places I have never been to.
This frightening world is closer to us than we can imagine.

In my works, the rough-surfaced unfinished style meets the decorative elements and sharp details. The tension between the two opposite forces is my key motive and is present in my art: There is often a contradiction between the contents and appearance in my paintings. Powerful and unexplainable atmosphere is important. I strive towards beauty, but to me, beauty is always somewhat sad and threatening.

Marikka Kiirikoff