Fire

Jyrki Parantainen always seeks to further his conceptual approaches and working methods. His practice combines the photographic medium with other genres of art. The phase of conception and preparation is a fundamental part of the creative process, which he likens to that of writing a script for a film. This acute sense for detail was most evident in Parantainen’s "Fire”’ series. It’s his most notable body work, taking over five years to complete and still today challenges the borders of how far we can push the photographic experience in terms of preparation, application and realization. These photographs explore the nature of our fears and what’s important through the sheer force of their reality, as all the fire scenes captured on film are in real time. Parantainen was responsible in all aspects of the totality of the project from the set designs to igniting and extinguishing the actual fires. Inspired by the films of Andrei Tarkovsky, Parantainen uses his Fire series as a reminder in how vulnerable we all are in the balance between the sublime and disaster.