PAULINA VARIS:

REFLECTIONS AND SEASONS OF GROWTH

9 MAY 2026 – 30 AUGUST 2026 | PRYKÄRI AULA (GLASS MUSEUM)

Reflections and Seasons of Growth by Paulina Varis explores a moment where direction is not given, but must be chosen. It is a kind of love letter to the experiences, lessons, and memories that shape us, yet are rarely shared.

The exhibition emerged from a point where past and future overlap. The choices that led here have required stillness and the confrontation of difficult emotions: grief, shame, envy, fear, disgust, and bitterness.

Phototropism describes how plants grow and turn toward the light. By attaching personal experiences to a form outside the self, it becomes possible to observe them from a distance without getting lost in them. The exhibition does not offer solutions, nor does it seek to comfort or explain. Instead, it observes phenomena, gestures, and change as they unfold quietly, out of sight.

The works are constructed from fragments of mirror, as if painting with glass. The pieces are joined using the Tiffany technique and set on wooden panels. They catch their surroundings and the viewer, shifting with light and movement.

In this way, the viewer does not remain outside, but becomes part of the work and its narrative. What happens in the shadows does not disappear—it changes form and moves alongside us, quietly present, come rain or come shine..

Deep in the embrace of darkness
in worry, in safety,
beneath a narrow shell

By the grace of its surroundings
a beginning lifts its head,
delicate and strong

Plants have no eyes,
no head nor neck
A shadow bends the stem
 
With all its strength
it seeks, without will, the ability
to reach toward the light
 
As growing pains,
as illusions of control,
as expectations,
as intentions
 
Slow movements, in secret,
trace patterns
when to bend
when to break 

-PAULINA VARIS (ORIGINAL POEM IN FINNISH)

Admission for the exhibition with a Glass Museum Prykäri ticket.