Stump

Lanu Park in Lahti was built between 1989 and 1992. The city of Lahti commissioned a total of 12 sculptures from Olavi Lanu to be placed in the deciduous Kariniemenmäki forest. The starting point of the sculptures was the body of work Lanu created for the Venice Biennale in 1978, entitled Life in the Finnish Forest, in which he explored the relationship between humanity and nature in various ways. Cast in concrete at the Renkomäki gravel pit, the sculptures in the park imitate natural materials. Blending in with their surroundings, the sculptures were all sited by the artist himself.

Olavi Lanu (1925–2015) was a visual artist, teacher and prominent figure in the Lahti art scene.

The sculpture depicts a tree stump growing on a rock. The stump reaches up towards the sky in the form of a female figure with raised arms. Arcing over the woman’s head to touch each other and hold her hair up, the figure’s arms lend a dancelike grace and linearity to the work, serving to enliven the otherwise faceless and expressionless figure. Mimicking the textures of wood and stone, the surface of the work was created by replicating natural textures with fibreglass blocks using resin and pine sap. The textures were then transferred onto plates of cheese wax, which were used to create a mould that was dug into the ground, onto which concrete was poured. After two weeks, the concrete cast was dug up and the mould disassembled, yielding a finished work.

Artwork on the map

In Lanu Sculpture Park. – Kariniemenpuistotie 49, Lahti.
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