Mina Fina: Everyday I Have to Pretend
15 February – 15 March 2024
P74 Gallery
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Mina Fina’s new exhibition seems like a break from her vow to women, which stated that she would protect and watch over them, their passions, beauty, and sexuality and that she would give them space for their vulnerability while expressing consistently and everywhere their intimacy, most profound feelings, and desires. Mina Fina’s women have always been both fragile and strong – because they have always been safe and protected. We could feel them; we could feel their sexuality, but we could never cross the threshold of their intimacy. Did she, Mina Fina, somehow change? Did the world around her change? Today, she tells us about the world her women came from. It’s as if she felt that she could now lay down the tools with which she’s been protecting them, that the lines with which she had always created a fragile but strong armour against our excessive intrusion into their intimacy were no longer needed. Here they are, as if pulling back the curtain, as if the outer walls are now gone, and all the colours have come to light, the shapes that have always been hidden appear to be coming to light, there is no more fear, no more tomorrow that occupies women’s thoughts every day and every hour, no more pondering one’s every word and step, now everything is here, in front of us, the intensity of yesterday’s guarded intimacy and personality is finally replaced with a simple yet powerful and very real image.
What made her feel this power or the need to share this intimacy with us? Was it the world that did change after all? Does today’s world allow her to let her women appear in front of our eyes just as they are, to expose them to our gaze? Mina Fina has so far been censoring the truth, effectively tearing women out of reality but placing them in a position of power. The emotion is recognisable; we know very well that her motherly attitude towards her women and images was at work. But the one who has grown up is not Mina Fina; her women have grown up; the world is more challenging than ever before, and it is more dangerous, but her women are now of age, so she lets them come in front of our eyes, strong in some different way, liberated differently; our gaze can no longer do anything to them, we can no longer hurt them, we can no longer own them. This exhibition is a break in time, space, and the artist’s language; we feel power and freedom – even though time puts more shackles on us and the future may be scary. And this is precisely what the artist tells us: freedom is when you know. Now we know. As soon as we step into the gallery, we know. And we also know something else: that we are welcome. That everything is ok. Suddenly, we are safe because they, Mina’s women, are protecting us.
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Mina Fina (1978) is a visual artist and graphic designer. In her artwork, she explores drawing, animation, and video and the transitions between these media, often in the final form of the installation. Her drawings actively intervene in a chosen environment. These are simple everyday images, portraits of imaginary friends, narrative fragments, conversation notes, etc. The structure of her drawings shows a highly individualised and intimate nature. Another one of her artistic interests is the representation of the woman’s body. Her interventions in old erotic magazines question the physical representation norms and place them in abstract compositions somewhere between a drawing and a collage. She has published several monographs, zines, and artist books. She is a member of the Ee design group and the YGT audio-visual collective. Since 2008, she has regularly exhibited in solo and group exhibitions at home and abroad.
