author
Ilmari Pimiä
1897–1989
A Finnish poet, visual artist, and drawing teacher, he moved in the lively circle of the Tulenkantajat group in the 1920s. His writing later turned toward memory, longing, and the lost landscapes of Karelia.
2 Audiobooks
Hurmioituneet kasvot : Runoja
by Elina Vaara, Yrjö Jylhä, Olavi Paavolainen, Ilmari Pimiä, Katri Vala, Lauri Viljanen
Näkinkenkä : Runoja
by Ilmari Pimiä
About the author
Born in Kivennapa on June 19, 1897, Ilmari Eino Pimiä was a Finnish writer, visual artist, and teacher of drawing. He studied at the Central School of Industrial Arts, graduated from Terijoki Co-educational School in 1916, and worked for many years as a drawing teacher in Viipuri and later in Helsinki.
Pimiä is especially remembered as a poet connected with the Tulenkantajat generation of the 1920s. Sources describe him as a close youthful friend and kindred spirit of Olavi Paavolainen, and note that he helped found the Kivennapa artists' society. His early poetry was known for its atmospheric tone, while his later work increasingly drew on spiritual themes and on the landscapes of the Karelian Isthmus.
After the wars, that connection to Karelia gave his poetry a strong note of homesickness and remembrance. He died in Helsinki on November 22, 1989, leaving behind work that links modernist literary circles with a deeply personal sense of place.