Annikki Luukela’s work with light is versatile. She has created light installations, sculpture, photographs, video and holograms. In stage performances, she has designed scenography based on light and performances based on light and shadows. She was one of the first light artists in Finland, starting her career in the beginning of 70’s. She was also one of the first artists to combine light and sound in her artworks.
Into working with light
As the earliest thing having an impact on her working with light, Luukela mentions her childhood in Northern Finland as one of the reasons she finds light as a relatable and natural material; years being divided in dark and light halves, northern lights, and especially experiencing bright sunlight on horizon of the white snowy sea ice, as everything but the luminous whiteness vanishes.
Luukela studied to be an art teacher, and spent two months in Paris as an au pair. There she visited the Lumière et mouvement exhibition in Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris in 1967. That was a turning point in her artistic career, where Luukela decided that light is her material. There she also first saw artworks of Frank J. Malina. After finishing her studies, she ended up continuing her light studies at Malina’s studio for a year in 1968-69.
That year was formative in Luukela’s artistic development, as she got to work with light, learn about its qualities and meet some other light using artists. After returning in Finland in 1969, she started using light as her main material. She developed her practice by experimenting with projections and reflections, at a time when light wasn’t well recognized in visual arts. She exhibited her first light-based artwork in a public exhibition in the Finnish Academy of Arts Triennial Exhibition in 1971.
Dimensio and further
Photorealism was the dominant art style in the beginning of the 70’s, and there was little room for anything else. Artists’ group Dimensio was born in 1972 as a counterbalance. Luukela was one of the founding members and her artworks have been part of several Dimensio group exhibitions, starting from the very first one in 1972. At the time, there were not many artists working with light or other electronic materials, and Dimensio provided Luukela the community of mutual help and support.
In 1975, Avaruuslauluja (Space Songs), a performance combining light, shadow and dance, a cooperation with dancer Raisa Vennamo, premiered in Helsinki Festival. It was the first of many of Luukela’s light visualisations for shadow dance, where the dancer performed as a shadow behind a screen, where light, mirror, reflections, hand painted dia slides and video was projected. The concept was based on Luukela’s experimentation with shadows in the previous years.
The main part of these performances was realised in cooperation with the dancer Leena Gustavson, who was very talented in improvisation and interacting with light elements. They were equal, discussive and reciprocal cooperations, where both could make suggestions on the other’s work, without hierarchy nor strictly defined working roles.
Luukela also worked with more traditional form of performances, like operas, theatre plays and contemporary dance performances, creating light visualisations. Compared to the term lighting design at the time, Luukela’s light visualisations didn’t merely illustrate time and place nof concentrated on making actors visible, but were creative, even abstract ways of building the ambience and making light as a performer in the performance.
Her lighting design could better be described as light visualisation: it didn’t follow the usual task of lighting design to illustrate time and place of the events, but had a more visual art based, abstract approach. Especially experimental performances fit her style and ambitions.
Even though Luukela still participated in some Dimensio exhibitions, her work with performance and light led her on her own way. Her last Dimensio exhibition was the group’s 30 years jubilee exhibition in 2003.
Reflections and holograms
Luukela has studied light and its reflections extensively in her work. For example, in her kinetic works she used polarisation as a base for the changing forms and patterns. Moving light has been in her use as rotating mirror reflections, and visual change in time has been achieved by programmed dia slides and theatre lighting technics. Even though modern technology has been needed to achieve the goals, it has always been just a tool for Luukela, not of interest in itself.
This also goes with holograms. In the beginning of 80’s, in one of her abstract light installations, Luukela noticed an illusion of light shapes hovering in front of the wall they were projected onto, and this led her to research holography. It wasn’t easy to find a suitable laboratory for it, but with some luck, she found one in Paris, France and later for her larger works in New York and Burlington, US.
Not all the artworks of Luukela were based in electrical technology. Her studies involved natural light and reflections, of both mirrors and water. Luukela compiled momentary, poetic installations in nature, which were presented in form of semi abstract photographs to the audience.
Then and now
Performance art wasn’t a widely known concept in Finland in the 70’s, nor was the experimental use of light and sound in visual arts or interactivity with the audience. In addition to some rave reviews, this also caused some dispute about the works even being art, at the time. Later on, Luukela’s vision has been revalued and appreciated. Today, she’s regarded as a pioneer in experimental artforms, and especially in light art.
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SOLO EXHIBITIONS
1978 Kluuvi gallery, VALON TULKINTA, Helsinki
1979 Wäinoe Aaltonen art museum, Turku
1981 Gallery Bronda, Helsinki
1982 Il Diaframma, Milano
1982 Kluuvi gallery, VALOVISIO, Helsinki
1983 Museum of Contemporary art, Tampere
1983 Pinacotheca, Jyväskylä
1983 Kemi art museum
1984 TM Gallery, Helsinki
1985 Alvar Aalto museum, Jyväskylä
1985 Kotka library
1986 Pyynikinlinna, Tampere
1986 Amos Andersonin taidemuseo, Helsinki
1988 Retretti, Punkaharju
1989 TM Gallery, Helsinki
1989 Cité internationale des Arts, Paris
1991 Heinola art museum
1992 Galleria Pictor, Nummela
1993 Poleeni, Pieksämäki
1996 Gallen-Kallela Museum, Espoo
1998 Finnish Institute, Paris
2000 Finnish Embassy, Washington
2000 NORTHERN LIGHTS , Dupont Circle Metro station, Washington
2002 Amos Anderson art museum, Helsinki
EXHIBITIONS WITH DIMENSIO
1972 Tampere museum of contemporary art
1973 Wäinoe Aaltonen museum, Turku
1973 Alvar Aalto museum, Jyväskylä
1974 Dipoli, Espoo
1976 Joenniemi art museum, Mänttä
1976 Amos Anderson art museum, Helsinki
1976 Tampere museum of contemporary art, Tampere
1977 Lahti art museum
1977 Touring exhibition in Lapland
1982 Kunsthalle, Helsinki
1986 Otso gallery, Espoo
1992 Tampere museum of contemporary art
2002 Dimensio 30 years, Salo art museum
2003 Dimensio 30 years Otso gallery, Espoo
STUDIES
1964–68 University of Art and Design Helsinki
1968–69 Frank J. Malina studios
2001–2003 University of Art and Design Helsinki, Master of Fine Arts
BIO
1944, born, Kemi, Finland
SOURCES
Kantokorpi, Otso: Tarvitsimme toisiamme in Kantokorpi, Otso: Dimensio 30 – Dimension vuodet 1972–2002. Dimensio, Like & Salon taidemuseo Veturitalli, Keuruu 2002.
Luukela, Annikki, interviews 19.2.2026, 10.6.2026 and 3.7.2026.
https://www.hs.fi/kulttuuri/art-2000003759144.html
LINKS
Wikipedia (FI)
FOKUS exhibition’s artists presentation (FI)
Luukela in Finnish Artist Register (FI)
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CREDIT
AUTHOR Mia Kivinen
PUBLISHED July 3rd 2026