The first friend I found was Victorine Nordenswan, but others were just there waiting for me.

I am Kelyne Reis, German -Brazilian born- visual Artist.

As a painter, I am a player who plays with colors and graphic shapes to tell a story (Yours?!).
Color is the main subject in my paintings. I let bold colors interact with each other, also hide
details, combine unexpected hues, and work with strong contrasts creating , apparently, simple
paintings.
The graphic shapes in my paintings always limit fields and situations.
When I start a work, I have a general idea about composition, colors and forms to use to
construct. But during the process of developing it, the painting gains its own life, interacting with
me, and often showing me directions I haven’t cogitated before.
The work is done when I feel that the emotional connection/dialogue exiting between the
painting and myself can now start happening between my painting and a viewer.

Today I will be talking about how my relationship with Hämeenlinna started.

Around end of 2021, I got to know that we (visual artists from BBK Celle/Germany) were going to have a collaborative exhibition with colleagues from our Finnish partner-city Hämeenlinna. So I started to look for information about city and country.

Finland was some kind of “mystery” for me. I just knew where this country was, but nothing else (please don’t forget that Brazil is very far away from this part of Europe!).

Where should I look for infos, if not in the internet?! So that’s what I did!

Reading about Hämeenlinna’s cultural past, I had my first encounter with Victorine Nordenswan, got intrigued and decided to dig a little deeper! 

Now I had found another mystery:  A talented female painter who lived in the 1800s, who had died very young and was practically unknown. 

Neither the Finnish National Gallery in Helsinki , nor even Victorine’s relatives could help me with more information than what I already had. I really needed more time to get closer to her!  During a year (!) Victorine and I were having long daily conversations (kind of crazy, don’t you think so?!), she gave me directions about how she wanted to get out of the shadows through my works. I followed them, went out of my comfort zone, painted two portraits of her in a very pop-art way, and brought her to the 21st Century.

Through Victorine’s hands I came to Hämeenlinna in 2022, but in 2023 were Minttu Saarinen and Kaputa Ry who brought me here – this time as a resident artist.