A blog by Katriina Etholén
A Swedish count, artist Louis Sparre founded a furniture factory in a small Finnish town called Porvoo in 1897. It lasted less than five years, but it's significance was all the more greater. An exhibition about this factory – Aktiebolaget Iris (or in English, the Iris Co. Ltd.) – is about to close in Porvoo... Continue Reading →
The theme of this post is the smithy. The smithy belonged to the oldest group of buildings of the whole complex. I visited the smithy three times. But only during the first visit on 12 October 2012 I really photographed the place. After that I went there just to try to remake two images. If I... Continue Reading →
Undercliffe Cemetery in Bradford had its first burial in March 1854. I visited this beautiful Victorian cemetery in September 2001. Now is time to publish the photos from that visit. When I travelled to Britain in September 2001, Undercliffe Cemetery was not on my list of places, where I had planned to visit. I sort... Continue Reading →
Music Archive is a series, where I write about albums or singles that have been released years ago, too long time ago to be enclosed in the “Reviews” category. Music Archive is thus forming its own subcategory under “Reviews”, even though these write-ups are not reviews, maybe not always even presentations. They are just stories... Continue Reading →
I like to learn kanji, but sometimes I face characters that are causing lots of trouble to me. One of them is a kanji for “write”, 書. I always try to find a way to climb to the top of the mountain. Let’s see what I have been thinking today. The kanji for “write” 書(か,... Continue Reading →
Richard Trevithick's steam locomotive made a successful journey on the Merthyr Tramroad on 21 February 1804. That was celebrated twenty years ago in Merthyr Tydfil and I was there as well. During my visit I walked part of the tramroad and this post is mainly based on the photos I took on my walk. This... Continue Reading →
I went to see Ryoji Ikeda's fantastic exhibition at Amox Rex art museum in Helsinki in autumn. In fact I went to see it twice. This exhibition that ends soon, is Ikeda's first solo exhibition in Finland. Ryoji Ikeda’s (born in 1966) exhibition can still be seen until 25 February at Amox Rex and on... Continue Reading →
Learning kanji is lots of fun. I love kanjis and usually I am getting carried away with them – like today. At the moment my goal is to learn three kanji characters per day, those characters that are thought in the Marugoto online course. But what happened: I ended up somewhere else. The theme of... Continue Reading →
A Japanese bass player, Hiroshi Morie, better known by his stage name HEATH, died in the end of October 2023. The news about his death were leaked to media in November. I read the news with great sadness. He was the prime mover in my new way of life. I was even more shocked when... Continue Reading →
Larin Paraske, an Ingrian runic singer, died on 3 January 1904. I had planned to write about her Porvoo years on my blog on this anniversary day, but I simply forgot. I didn't forget Larin Paraske, but I forgot that the anniversary was in the beginning of this year. I realized that two weeks too... Continue Reading →
Tales From The Brazier's Grotto 