Winter is the longest season in Finland, lasting about 200 days in Lapland and 3-4 months in the southern part of the country.
Temperatures in the north of the country are usually below freezing for most of the winter, providing a sense of absolute peace and crystal-clear air.
A fairytale landscape will unfold before your eyes, with abundant snow, frozen lakes, and the chance to admire the Northern Lights, the icing on the cake.
In Lapland, everything seems muffled, with the snow reflecting an almost unreal light, even illuminating the polar night.
The first snow of the season, “ Ensilumi ” in Finnish, is always a very exciting moment, eagerly awaited by Finns, and its arrival, given the large size of Finland, which extends for over 1000 kilometers from north to south, can vary depending on where you are.
In Lapland, which lies mostly above the Arctic Circle, the first snow arrives as early as September, although I happened to encounter it many years ago in late June during the car transfer from Ivalo Airport to Inari.
Finland is a wonderful country that I recommend visiting in any season, but if you want to see it at its most elegant and fascinating, choose winter!
Thinking about Finnish winter I had the idea to ask twelve incredibly talented Finnish artists to show us “ Suomen talvi “ through their eyes, and I must say, the result of this experiment is truly astonishing, as you’ll see
In the article, along with a brief introduction to the artist, you’ll find two paintings: the first is her “ Suomen talvi “ and the second is one of her favorites
I invite you to visit their social media pages and websites to better understand their talent.
If you are interested in some of their works, the artists could reserve a small discount for the readers of my Blog
To Satu Kekäläinen, Mari Knuuttila, Meria Q, Paula Mikkilä, Milla Piirainen, Taru Rouhiainen, Minna Scheinin, Saila Seppo, Kaisa Sirén, Maj Sjö, Martina Uthardt, Liisa Viima, I extend my heartfelt thanks for making my idea possible
Satu Kekäläinen
Satu Kekäläinen, she was born in Helsinki, but after living in various places across Finland, she currently lives in Lieto.
Ice is a sort of common thread that has accompanied Satu throughout her life, but artistically it all began in 2015 when, needing to find strength and breathe fresh air, she immersed herself in the nature of nearby Lake Littoistenjärvi, and since it was winter, she began photographing with her camera the figures she saw in the lake ice.
You can see her works on her Instagram and Facebook pages and website
For Suomen talvi , she presents: Winter Fairy – aluminium print 30 × 40 cm edition 1/10 – photographed under a blue sky in the sunshine with a macro mirroring function from ice collected from Finnish winter nature
As a second works, she presents: The Soul of the Water – aluminium print 30 × 40 cm edition 1/10 – macro photography of ice collected from nature in winter in the colors and energies of blue anemones in spring
Mari Knuuttila
Mari Knuuttila born in Lapua, a town located in Southern Ostrobothnia and where she currently lives and creates her works in her studio.
Mari has been painting for about seven years, although her main profession is that of Chief Inspector at the State Administrative Agency, a role that requires strict compliance with laws and regulations.
Through painting, Mari has found a way to give free rein to her visual art, free from rules or pre-established patterns.
You can find more information about Mari on her Instagram and Facebook pages and website
For Suomen talvi she presents: Winter Silence – acrylic / mixed media on canvas 89 x 115 cm – this work captures the quiet strength of the Nordic winter – a frozen horizon where light and shadow meet in stillness. Layers of texture reflect frost, earth and the silent breath of the northern landscape.
As a second painting she presents: With You – mixed media on canvas 80.5 x 65 cm – a layered field of ochre and shadow speaks of intimacy, memory and silent strength. The surface carries traces of time, emotion and the quiet power of being together.
Both paintings are available for purchase on her website.
Meria Q aka Merja Sipiläinen-Kuhlberg
Merja Sipiläinen-Kuhlberg was born in Artjärvi (Lake of Art in english) but lives in Turku, a beautiful city on the west coast of Finland.
Meria Q became interested in art as a young girl, sketching evening dresses in her notebooks, and she cultivated this interest as a teenager by designing fabric prints.
As often happens, life sometimes takes strange turns, and Meria Q, abandoning her passion for art, took a different direction that led her into the world of marketing and business.
However, in early 2010, her artistic creativity reawakened and has been unstoppable ever since.
She held her first solo exhibition in 2018, followed by numerous others.
You can find more information about Meria Q on her Instagram page and website
For Suomen talvi she presents: First snow on the mountains – watercolour 19×14 cm, 2020 – this wonderful painting, which is a hymn to the joy of the first snow falling on the mountains, is part of the series that Merja Q has dedicated to Lapland.
As a second painting she presents: Poppies – watercolour 28×38 cm, 2023 – these wonderful poppies are fragile red spots, which in the middle of a field can give the hearts of sensitive people incredible emotions.
Both paintings are available for purchase on her website.
Paula Mikkilä
Paula Mikkilä born in Karvia, a hidden pearl of Finland surrounded by the wonderful rural landscapes of the Karvianjoki river, but resident in Tampere for over twenty years.
She graduated from the Department of Teacher Education at the University of Jyväskylä as a teacher specializing in fine arts and has dedicated a good part of her life to teaching as an elementary school teacher sharing much of her creative moments with children and teenagers.
In the 80s she created a considerable quantity of oil paintings, then after her move to Tampere she devoted herself to bronze sculpture and for almost twenty years in the evenings after her school work she went to the foundry.
Working with bronze is not easy, but it’s incredibly rewarding, like the material itself, which, once transformed into a work of art, can convey incredible emotions.
Paula draws inspiration for her works from her surroundings: home, nature, animals, and people, who, once part of her creative process, tell stories and fairy tales that take on an imaginative life of their own.
You can find more information about Paula on her Instagram page and website
For Suomen talvi she presents: Two white spruces – acrylic, 40×40 cm, 2020 – this very beautiful painting is part of the series “Sheltered by the Forest”
As a second work she presents: Two spruces – bronze, 29/26/13 cm, 2018 – a beautiful bronze statue depicting two spruces
Both works are available for purchase on her website.
Milla Piirainen
Milla Piirainen is a Helsinki-based visual artist.
Her work is characterized by a versatile use of colors, materials, and techniques, through which she portrays human experiences and natural phenomena.
She works with acrylic, oil, and mixed media and primarily uses a palette knife, with which she has created her distinctive, layered, and vividly textured painting style.
Her works do not settle for a merely aesthetic impression but invite the viewer to explore deeper meanings and emotions that art can evoke.
She is primarily a marine painter, and the sea is a subject she returns to again and again. Flowers are also part of her artistic expression. The interplay of the characteristic colors and forms of the sea and flowers offers her endless possibilities for creativity
You can find more information about Milla on her Instagram page and website
For Suomen talvi she presents: Purpura – oil on canvas 82 x 92 cm (with frame) – in this stream flowing between snow-covered trees, Milla used shades of violet and purple to paint the shadows on the snow and the reflections in the icy water. At first glance, we are greeted by a magical atmosphere where light plays a fundamental role. A very beautiful painting!
As a second painting she presents: Light – acrylic on canvas 70 x 60 diptych – This work is a treatise on light and shadow. While painting, she tell the viewer stories about the beauty that surrounds me. Light and shadow go hand in hand like lovers. This story is about love. Light, light.
Both paintings are available for purchase on her website.
Taru Rouhiainen
Taru Rouhiainen born in Hyvinkää but currently lives in Vantaa.
Taru’s is one of those stories that shows us how not only painting, but art in general, can be the best medicine for overcoming difficult times.
In 2020, after the crisis, Taru found herself needing something that would allow her not only to stay busy but also to process and express her feelings.And so, making a life-changing choice, she enrolled in a painting course and fell in love with art!
Before discovering painting, she had always appreciated colors and, above all, their effect on our emotions, bringing joy into our homes.
You can find more information about Taru on her Instagram and Facebook pages and website
For Suomen talvi she presents: White noise – mixed medium in canvas90×70 cm – in this abstract work Taru makes us understand how she loves to play with colors, layers and textures that make her work full of emotions, stories and energy.
As a second painting she presents: Waterlilly – mixed medium on canvas 73×60 cm – this painting is part of the “Lummelampi” series and is inspired by the famous Water Lilies series by Monet, reinterpreting the theme with a material and contemporary style, depicting pink and white water lilies floating on a pond in blue and green tones, with bold brushstrokes that create a sense of movement of the water.
Both paintings are available for purchase on her website.
Minna Scheinin
Minna Scheinin was born in Turku, a beautiful city on the west coast of Finland, where she lived for a long time before moving to Kaarina, where she currently lives.
Minna often visits Italy, where she has a home on Lake Iseo, and she says this Italian experience has greatly influenced her artistic development.
She worked for many years as a foreign language teacher ( Swedish and English ) and was responsible for pedagogical development and online teaching at her University of applied sciences.
In 2011, she successfully completed a professional photography course at the New York Institute of Photography ( online ) and in 2013, she earned a degree in editorial graphics.
Since then, her photographic work has transformed into an artistic journey where her creativity has finally found a way to express itself through her art.
Minna expresses her art through photography, which plays a primary role, but also through painting and mosaics.
In photography, she began studying the ICM ( Intentional Camera Movement ) technique, which began a journey that led her to essentially paint with the camera, intentionally moving it during the exposure.
Nature is her greatest source of inspiration, and the deepest essence of her images is the beauty that surrounds us and often goes unnoticed.
You can find more information about Minna’s artistic work on her Instagram page and these are her email addresses : scheinin.minna@gmail.com minna@scheinin.fi
For Suomen talvi she presents: Winter night – acrylic painting, 42 x 29,7 cm – with this painting, Minna managed to recreate the magical atmosphere of a Finnish winter night and embellished the painting with small fragments of glass capable of giving it a natural brilliance typical of the wonderful polar night.
As a second work she presents: Snowballs – photograph – with this very suggestive image Minna has captured a winter phenomenon in which small accumulations of snow or frost settle on the tips of common reeds (Phragmites australis) that emerge from partially frozen bodies of water with bright reflections created by the sun
Both works are available for purchase on her website.
Saila Seppo
Saila Seppo was born in Kouvola but moved to Sastamala at the age of 1 or 2.
She studied in Espoo and currently live in Helsinki from a long time.
She worked at the Kemira factory in Pori and has worked and continues to work for the Research Council of Finland.
She is a member of the Helsinki Art Association, Espoo Art, and the Finnish Artists’ Association.
Saila is undoubtedly a multifaceted artist, and for her, the most important thing in art is the ability to create a new, diverse, and colorful work of art.
Saila holds a PhD in chemistry and a degree in technology, and thanks to these studies, she has a deep understanding of materials and pigments. This offers her a wide range of artistic possibilities, which she translates into her works, which closely resemble naive art, but in this case, I would say technological.
Thanks to her research, Saila created Sisusavi®, a material developed from natural ingredients that works well with all types of dyes, giving paintings a vivid surface and vibrant colors.
Sisusavi® is a soft, water-based, moldable mass that can be colored with pigments or vegetable dyes and hardens at room temperature through water evaporation.
Sisusavi® is a natural microcellulose material that contains no clay or plastic dyes, and the mass reproduces even the smallest details.
This product, entirely developed by Saila, is available for sale on Greenbutton.fi.
More information about Saila can be found on her social media pages, Instagram and Facebook, and on her website, sailaseppoart.fi,
For Suomen talvi she presents: Snow – Sisusavi® and pigments on canvas, 47×55 cm – this large snow-covered tree, surrounded by a blanket of snow and kissed by the sun, has a naive, almost artisanal feel and the cracking effect due to the use of Sisusavi® makes it almost look like a material mosaic.
As a second painting she presents: Flowers on Display – Sisusavi® and pigments on canvas, 40×59 cm – this work is part of the Sisusavi® project which stands out for its naive and material artistic style, characterised by a vibrant use of colour and three-dimensional textures that convey a sense of joy.
Both paintings are available for purchase on her website.
Kaisa Sirén
Kaisa Sirén lives in Rovaniemi, within the Arctic Circle of Finnish Lapland, where she works as a freelance photographer and artist.
She is a photographic artist who makes the landscape of her soul visible with Intentional Camera Movement, using the northern landscapes of Finland as a backdrop.
She focuses on themes related to the seasons of Lapland and the delicacy of nature.
She selects subjects from nature and transforms them into elements that were initially absent, thus visualizing the invisible.
She is the co-founder of the ICM Photo Academy, where she teaches ICM photography courses both in person and online.
She has held several solo and group exhibitions in Finland, Sweden, Denmark, Scotland, the United States, and Germany, and since 2017, she has run an art gallery called Villa Vinkkeli in her hometown.
Her artistic focus is entirely on ICM photography and artistic creation.
ICM offers a way to make invisible feelings and repressed emotions visible.
When taking a photo in ICM, camera movement can create elements that were initially absent in the scene, making invisible elements visible.
This technique possesses the same randomness and element of surprise that have always accompanied Kaisa throughout her life.
More information about Kaisa can be found on her social media pages, Instagram and Facebook, and on her website
For Suomen talvi she presents: First Snow – acrylic painting, 2025, unframed 60x80cm – in this Arctic landscape, Kaisa captures the magical moment of the first snowfall covering the autumn vegetation. The contrast between the warm tones (red and pink) of the earth and the cold tones (blue and grey) of the sky is her stylistic signature, with which she seeks to make visible the “invisible” emotions and sensations of nature. Also noteworthy is the vegetation (the red and purple marks in the foreground) which are transformed into abstract shapes.
As a second work she presents: Solitude – photograph, 2025, unframed 30x40cm – this beautiful photograph by Kaisa, where the minimalist aspect of the scene prevails, leads us to a reflection on solitude which is not necessarily a negative feeling but in this case a condition of deep connection with the wild nature of Lapland.
Both works are available for purchase on her website.
MAJ SJÖ
Maj SJÖ, born in Helsinki, where she has a studio space in Kaapelitehdas, Finland’s largest cultural centre, but currently lives in Espoo where she also creates in her home studio.
When I first saw MaJ’s works, I immediately understood how she managed to capture and convey in her art all those small and large miracles that life can give us day after day.
Her collection of works on the Archipelago and in general on everything that is sea or water (after all, her surname SJÖ in Swedish means lake/sea) can convey incredible emotions and for those like me who have experienced the magic that Hanko can convey, looking at her paintings that portray her means reliving moments of indescribable joy and serenity.
You can find more information about Maj on her Instagram and Facebook pages and website
For Suomen talvi she presents: Winter Magic – oil on canvas, 2022, 100 x 80 cm – this painting features an ethereal, almost magical style, typical of Nordic illustrations, where snow and soft light create a suspended, enchanted atmosphere. The almost monochromatic choice, with a strong emphasis on white and elongated shadows (like that of the fox in the center), is a distinctive element that evokes the silence and solitude of Nordic winter landscapes.
As a second painting she presents: What a Lady! – oil on canvas, 2023, 50 x 50 cm – in the background of this painting you can see a famous Helsinki landmark (Havis Amanda), which makes it very Finnish.
Both paintings are available for purchase on her website.
Martina Uthardt
Martina Uthardt, born in Malax, where she currently lives in this big village and welcoming of about 5000 inhabitants in Southern Ostrobothnia, where Swedish is spoken rather than Finnish (about 6% of Finns speak Swedish)
After a 10-year stint running a photography agency specializing in portraits, Martina has dedicated herself fully to painting professionally since 2021.
She has experimented with various techniques but currently prefers acrylic painting with its possibilities for layering and variations that make each painting alive and unique in different lights.
When I first saw Martina’s paintings, I was struck by how this artist was able to perfectly represent the Finland I love so much.
You can find more information about Martina on her Instagram and Facebook pages and website
For Suomen talvi she presents: Just Breathe – acrylic on canvas, 2021, 65 x 81 cm – this painting is intended to evoke a moment of pause and awareness, an invitation to slow down and take a breath of fresh air through the delicate pink and white tones contrasted by bold graphic lines. It is part of her abstract art collection, characterized by a style she herself defines as “mindful” allowing colors and shapes to play freely on the canvas.
As a second painting she presents: Togetherness – acrylic on canvas, 2025, 100 x 81 cm – the painting depicts two swans swimming side by side under a large full moon in a Nordic landscape at night. The artist has described it as a “must-see” subject, conveying feelings of calm and beauty. The work explores the theme of connection and harmony, using swans as symbols of loyalty and enduring love.
Both paintings are available for purchase on her website.
Liisa Viima
Liisa Viima, born in Oulu and currently based in Espoo.
Although she began painting as a teenager and dreamed of becoming a professional artist, she chose a more conventional path, earning a master’s degree in economics and dedicating herself to her family, including raising two daughters and caring for horse – her lifelong passion.
After facing significant life challenges, Liisa experienced a personal transformation that led her back to her original calling: painting.
Her mission became clear – to bring joy and beauty into the world through her art.
Liisa’s style is contemporary and abstract, often infused with elements of realism, surrealism, and even whimsy.
Recurring themes in her work include humanity, love, and forgiveness, expressed through symbolic imagery such as faces, hearts, stars, hands, the moon, pigeons and also horses.
For Liisa, horses represent courage and nobility values that have guided her life and artistic journey.
You can find more information about Liisa on her Instagram and Facebook pages and website
For Suomen talvi she presents: Mattitja – mixed media. Acrylic, oil, plaster reliefs, brick, mica pigment and epoxy, 2025, 90c90x4cm – from her Modern Icons collection – This painting explores the identity and deep awareness of being and includes some recurring symbols in the works of this artist, such as the dove (symbol of peace), the burning heart and floral motifs that evoke themes of spiritual awakening and love.
As a second painting she presents: Ani Or – mixed media. Acrylic, oil, plaster reliefs, brick, mica pigment and epoxy, 2026, 90c90x4cm – from her Modern Icons collection – this painting features a central figure with a golden halo, surrounded by purple roses, a dove in her hand, and a pulsating red heart on her chest. Liisa’s style, characterized by an expressive use of color, bold textures, and the integration of symbolic and spiritual elements, truly emerges.
Both paintings are available for purchase on her website.
While
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