The Rovaniemi city board of culture and the Rovaniemi County board of culture and leisure granted sculptor Kari Huhtamo the mutual culture award of Rovaniemi as a reward of long term artistic qualification.

The rewarding ceremony coincided the local theme event “Rovaniemi –päivät” at the Rovaniemi Art Museum on Saturday, September the 6^th 2003 during “Taiteiden puolesta” (“On behalf of Arts”) –event.

While assigning the award Mr.. Pertti Heikkilä chairman of the Rovaniemi County culture and leisure board expressed great respect for Huhtamo “The people granting this award are very well aware of the challenge taken when growing to become a true professional artist, from the Northern periphery of Finland”. It takes unconditional devotion for work and endlessly sparkling glow of creativity. Huhtamo's artistic personality and his journey of creativity prove that it's possible to achieve the established goals and simultaneously set an encouraging example for art learner generations to come.   

Kari Huhtamo was born in Rovaniemi on November 1st, 1943. He studied at the Finnish Art Academy School in 1961-1964 and has lived in Helsinki since 1961. Kari Huhta­mo's claim to fame has been sculpting. In addition to constructions, medals and portraits his productions include litho­graphs and serigraphs as well as textile productions. In the early years of his career he used as materials he used wood, lightweight concrete and second-hand materials for his sculptures and later, aluminum, plastic and bronze.

Starting in the 70's his main material became stainless steel. One of Huhtamo's first public sculptures is the Re­construction of Lapland 1945 - 1955 memorial in Rovaniemi, which he was appointed to carry out in 1969. From the mid 1970's he has designed numerous public works, sculptures have been ordered from him and he has successfully participated in sculpting competitions.

Huhtamo's steel sculptures have been described as being "cosmic graphics". According to Juhani Pallasmaa, Huhta­mo's sculptures are like draw­ings made into a space, like rhythmic events in space. He appositely proposes that when speaking of Huhtamo's sculptures it would be more suitable to speak of drawn sculptural art instead of the traditional molding and sculpting process.

Huhtamo's works have also been said to emphasize sensual­ity. The sculptures contain hidden figurativeness - human forms, rhythmicness of insects and plants and other references to nature. Although the spectator often finds something recogniz­able, the abstract works remain open to new interpretations.

Huhtamo' s style has often been described as being "Huhtamo-­like", which tells a great deal of the originality of his art . The abstract language of forms derives itself from the tradition of modern sculpture, and one of Huhtamo's most recognizable characteristics is the free, expressive exploration of forms. The central elements in his graphic prints, textile works and sculptures are multiform geo­metric and organic shapes as well as the straight ål1d curved lines that give them their rhythm.

(9.9.2003 / Rovaniemen kaupunki)