Harri Monni in this body of new work uses the language of the abstract and the significations and ambiguity of color to investigate the dynamics and relationships which lie at the borders of meanings and objects. The mark of the paint and the query of the shadow, the vague insinuation of landscape in hyper close-up and the language of the nonobjective, the layers of the history of painting and the vocabulary of the abstract, capture the interaction between painting as both psychological pivot and physical expression. The painting surface and the allusion of object and panorama, the shadow and the spectacle of motion, leap forth from this new body of work as a process of intense reflection and perception on the condition of painting and the layers of understanding which the viewer may meander through.  The questions which Monni asks us to ponder, and the meanings generated by the open quest he posits, both results and resides in a work that visually comes alive in pronounced, layered strokes of pigment on canvas and as landscapes of both the world and our thoughts.

Monni, using the divergent and converging trails of history, painting language and the question of the viewer to the abstract and vaguely recognizable, stresses a interplay and problematic between the objective and the subjective. The relationships are reciprocal: his patterns and objects both appear and disappear in the overall physicality and structure of the painted surface, become both confrontationally contradictory and reconciliation of the benign to the meanings and histories they elicit.

1997.02.28 Dagens Nyheter. Påtaglig tvetydighet.
Lars.O.Ericsson

2001.12.01 Svenska Dagbladet. Utmaningen finns under kartans yta. Anna Brodow

2002.02.21 Helsingin Sanomat. Maalarikyky Tukholmasta. Anne Rouhiainen

2003.08.10 Göteborgsposten.Dilemmat med det flata rummet. Mikael Olofsson

2004.05.20 Helsingin Sanomat. Kurkistuksia laatikkoihin ja hauta-huoneisiin. Jukka Yli-Lassila

2008.03.14 Svd. Kontrollerat målerikaos i takt med tiden. Anna Brodow

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