Art critic Arttu Seppänen reviews works seriously and thoughtfully. So is ex-figure skater Kiira Korve’s poetry book, whose review attracted wide attention last week.
– I think that a critic is probably never ready.
Even the title sums up the work in direct words: Kiira Korve’s poetry book is miserable, and its publication is downright irresponsible.
The criticism was followed by an uproar and a direct flood of messages.
In Seppänen’s opinion, the case showed once again that Finns’ media literacy and understanding of art criticism are \”unfortunately weak\”.
– The general prejudice towards us critics is that, for example, I would have liked to tile Kiira Korve’s work for fun.
However, this is not the case.
– You don’t get enough pay for this considering the kind of storm I got into. That I would give harsh criticism just for the fun of it.
Seppänen says that he evaluates works seriously and with equal criteria. It’s his passion.
From the Suomirap forum to Helsingin Sanomat
Arttu Seppänen’s path as a critic began in the early 2000s, when he started writing reviews of Finnish rap publications for the suomihiphop.com website. He was 14 years old at the time.
The site later became posse.fi, which eventually became basso.fi.
– I started writing a lot about marginal Finnish rap, which people published as self-publishing. I was actively writing long stories, and I was really inspired by that community.
Seppänen says that at some point a dream began to form that he could write art criticism for magazines.
– When I was young, when I went to school by bus, I always read Hesar on the way, still the old broadsheet size. In a full bus, you could twist and turn to read it if someone was sitting next to you.
Today, he spends most of his time working on art. Listens to music, reads books, goes to concerts, talks with friends about art.
– Art has always been a big passion for me. I’m not terribly dedicated to anything else in this life.
In art criticism, people think from time to time how familiar with art one must be in order to be a critic.
According to Seppänen, there must be a certain level of education. But it will hardly ever be completely finished.
– I feel that I am developing as a critic all the time and my texts are getting better. I do them really ambitiously.
He says that good criticism reflects the critic’s subjective enthusiasm or lack of enthusiasm for the work in question.
– It must then be well justified. Utilizing culture and relating the evaluated work to others and to the surrounding world and culture.
Seppänen himself graduated from vocational school as a data scientist and then studied journalism at the University of Jyväskylä.
As a minor subject, he has studied, among other things, art history and literature.
– The kind of critic I am has drawn a lot from writing experience and general civility. Academic background is definitely beneficial, although not a requirement.
– Helsingin Sanomat is a big newspaper with power. With that comes responsibility.
Sometimes criticisms have to be weighed for a couple of weeks. In Seppänen’s opinion, everything must be carefully justified.
– I always thought, Can I say or claim something and how do I justify what I say.
The critic takes art seriously
When you publish art, you also enter the realm of public criticism, Seppänen states.
He understands well why people are offended by criticism.
– They can easily feel like a personal insult. That here now a professional critic is criticizing this thing I like and my taste is being mocked.
According to Seppänen, however, that is not the case. In the case of Kiira Korve, the object of the criticism herself received the feedback in the right way, in her opinion.
– Kiira Korpi said on Instagram that she plans to continue writing. Go ahead! I think he knew how to deal with criticism well.
Arttu Seppänen thinks it would be disrespectful to the work to criticize it lightly.
– The criticism must have come as a surprise to the publishing house, because the post-explanation gave the impression that the book should have been treated as somehow an inferior book of poetry, even though it was marketed as a book of poetry and is classified as such by the library. As if it’s wrong to call the lyrics of the work bad, because it was made as a bad lyric in the first place.
*You can discuss the topic until Saturday, March 25 at 11 p.m.*