Veen emäntä (Mistress of the Water)

The Mistress of the Water (Veen emäntä) explores the fluid boundaries between water, glass, and time. Grounded in my Finnish-Ukrainian heritage, the exhibition connects two mythic water-spirits—the Ukrainian Mavka and the Finnish Vellamo. Both figures embody the mysterious, unyielding power of nature, serving as guardians of an aquatic realm that is at once mesmerizing, elusive, and deeply ancient.

The material of glass shares an inherent, elemental kinship with water and ice. In its molten state, glass behaves like a liquid, while its solid form captures optical transparency, refraction, and frozen movement. Mastering molten glass through traditional blowing techniques requires physical endurance and intent—a somatic dialogue between the artist and a fluid medium that continually resists absolute human control.

The exhibition examines impermanence, transient beauty, and ecological cycle. Just as water transforms from rain to waves and ice, existence relies on perpetual movement and surrender. Not even the mythic Mistress of the Waters can command time; after every loss, life begins anew. By shifting hot glass from traditional applied design into the territory of spatial installation, The Mistress of the Waters captures fleeting moments of clarity, offering a poignant reflection on environmental fragility, the passage of time, and the elemental forces that sustain us.