While Eronen was a student at the Finnish Art Academy, Ateneum, (1948-1951), the institution underlined the importance of design, and of art’s usefulness above all. The motto of the academy was “Pro Arte Utile“.
The postwar period in Finland was a time of reconstruction, which involved a huge nationwide effort. It took courage to embark on an artistic career at such a moment. Students were expected to work hard and had to survive the Academy’s annual elimination procedure.
Upon graduation, Erkki Eronen could have gone into industry, but he chose the path of an independent sculptor. However, his creative process is related to industrial design, and when dealing with commissions, he maintained a close dialogue with the client and strove to ensure that the final result corresponded to their wishes as well as to his own vision.
In his sculptures, Eronen pursued a kind of architectural simplicity. ‘Art is about building bridges,’ he once said. His goal was to give a shape to commonly shared ideas, to mutual exchanges and to collective experience. This relates back to the industrial design process where the client is an active agent who has a right to delineate certain aspects of the work at the inception phase.
Eronen exercised his artistic freedom for purposes of communication and problem-solving, and to reconcile the composition and harmony of each sculpture with the client’s wishes. The deep attachment to individual freedom also supported Eronen’s determination not to compromise his artistic expression.
Eronen championed the purity of art. He remained at the distance from the limelight and art establishment. Yet at the time of his death in 2018, he was one of the most long-standing members of the Finnish Sculptors’ Association.