Dia de los Muertos and Sexy Carvings Art, Verkatehdas Hämeenlinna.

A Festival for the Dead, in the Middle of Finland

Sometimes I enter a room and at first do not know where I have landed. That is how it was at Verkatehdas in Hämeenlinna, on the first floor, where it grows dark and the light falls in violet and green over raw wooden figures. Skeletons on motorcycles, carved figures the height of a person, walls full of pictures in bold colors, and in between, skulls and an altar where visitors can leave a photo of their departed. A Mexican festival of the dead, in the middle of Finland.

First the Question, Then the Answer

At first I was certain I was looking at Mexican art. The music, the light, the skulls, everything felt like Mexico. Only at home, after some research, did it turn out that two Finns are behind it: the sculptor Tapani Kokko and the musician Sakke Järvenpää, who paints under the name Bonehead Zack and whom many know from the Leningrad Cowboys.

What I saw there about the Día de los Muertos, about death, the body and the humor within it, and why the room would not let go of me, I have written down at length in the magazine.