Virpi Vairinen
- Finland -
A fascinating, inspiring poet of everyday dreariness
Virpi Vairinen’s experimental poetry is notably accessible even without prior knowledge of the contemporary techniques she skillfully employs. At her core, Vairinen is a minimalist, distilling poetry to its purest essence:observation, aesthetics, and efficient communication.
Vairinen has published four books of poetry, and one chapbook, Maisemia joihin pelot sopivat (2017, Landscapes Where Fears Fit In), that feels as complete as any of her book-length works. She stands out as one of the most web-savvy Finnish poets, adeptly conveying the randomness of online experience into an older, more prestigious but also less-read medium. Her work reflects deep respect for this form that can hold immense energy within a small space, a form that has also withstood the test of time rather well. A book of poetry.
In her academic pursuits, Vairinen has explored the works of American novelist Don DeLillo, who combines an antiquated sense of privacy and belief in literary communication with the hyper-digital and consumerist mindfuck-of-a-reality that the world has since turned into. Similarly, Vairinen seems to act as a poetic messenger, a Hermes-like figure between the analogue and the online.
Previously, Vairinen worked as the editor-in-chief of the digital poetry platform Nokturno, gaining a profound understanding of poetry’s function and possibilities on the web. Despite this, her own work thrives on many aspects and qualities that can only be developed and felt on paper.
The fonts, the layout, the images, as well as their relations to each other matter a lot when reading Vairinen’s poetry: at times, she even seems to question the primacy of words and their meanings in poetry. While being produced in a modern printing facilities, Vairinen’s books retain a certain handmade quality and feel, a perverted zine-like materiality reminiscent of a bygone era of arts and crafts, even when their poems address more contemporary themes.
Her debut collection, Kuten avata äkisti (2015, As to Open Suddenly), exemplifies this blend of old and new, material and immaterial. It captures a day in the life of a poet in detail, counting, for instance, the cigarettes she smokes as the poems pass. The book includes a poem that makes use of the English phrase “in his formative years,” an innocent-sounding expression that the poem makes into a metaphor for a mold, a passive container that holds a person’s life and all the years within it. One cannot form a life by oneself, only be formed by these inhuman things around us: like a cityscape that can be a formative experience to someone, but also a mere pass-through for countless others.
Vairinen’s work has a strong sense of subjectivity, yet there is always a myriad of subjectivities hovering nearby and sometimes making their way into a poem.
The magic of her poetry lies in the way she gathers disparate observations into a single piece – a stanza, a poem, a chapter, a book, an oeuvre. There is a quirky sense of humor that might go unnoticed at first. Even in Kaikki tapahtuu niin paljon (2020, Everything Happens So Much), a tribute to her late partner, digital poet Marko Niemi (1974–2019), there is laughter amidst the sorrow, a shared interest in comedy between lovers, which makes the passing away of the other half almost unbearably sad.
Vairinen’s willingness to be vulnerable and open about her thoughts and emotions – situating a vulnerable lyric “I” in the middle of everything – makes Vairinen’s work more subjective and emotionally resonant than that of many experimental poets. In the early 2000s, the Finnish experimental poetry scene was heavily influenced by the rise of Google and other tools provided by the ”Information Superhighway”, often weaving anonymous online writings together in their poetry. Vairinen, on her part, could be described as a Web 2.0 poet, who captures the online anxiety and the subjective sense of dread of our times, rather than the utopian possibilities once envisioned.
Reading Vairinen, one marvels at how seemingly unrelated elements – such as stock market data, newspaper clippings, “scientific” structured lists of random thoughts, and handwritten survivalist notes in her collection Ilmanala(2017, Air Area) – coalesce under her poetic umbrella, suggesting connections that have gone previously unnoticed from the reader.
Given the apocalyptic undertones in Vairinen’s work, the state of ignorance prior to reading it can feel rather blissful post factum. Her newest book, Antiluuppi (2023, Anti-Loop[e]), cleverly combines the even-toed ungulate species of antelopes from the African savannah with the concept of a loop, making it probably her best work to date. Antiluuppi is a book about fractured history, symbolized by black-and-white photographs of broken oval-shaped chains (possibly cookies). It is a book about waiting for something to happen, probably an impending catastrophe, yet it ultimately focuses on the mundane act of waiting itself, the everyday boredom and dullness of it.
It is a rare feat to be a fascinating and inspiring poet even when (and sometimes: because of) dealing with seemingly dreary subject matters, and Vairinen succeeds in it convincingly every time.
Essay by Vesa Rantama
Poetry
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SILICON VALLEY / PIILAAKSO
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Why people die in movies / Miksi ihmiset kuolevat elokuvissa
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Bodies of the Industrial Revolution / Teollisen vallankumouksen ruumiit
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It's too late to negotiate the rules when the cards are on the table / On myöhäistä sopia säännöistä, kun kortit ovat jo pöydällä
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It would be difficult to imagine you with another name / Olisi vaikea kuvitella sinut toisennimiseksi
