The prison becomes a free space.

This was the tagline of VALTIO+, a collaborative arts exhibition that took place in 2015 at the decommissioned Turku Central Prison, an institution known as “Kakola” due to its location on Kakola Hill in Turku, Finland. Published in cooperation with this exhibition, Welcome To Wherever You Are is the product of Finnish artist Timo Vaittinen’s fascination with the artwork that survives within Kakola, specifically those created by a former inmate, Toivo Valasti. In his introductory essay—published in both English and Finnish—Vaittinen establishes the history of Kakola, the formation of his relationship with the space and its art, and the story of Valasti during his incarceration. Welcome To Wherever You Are is a catalogue of black-and-white images of Valasti’s artworks, pencil and collage-like wall creations that draw on themes ranging from National Socialist ideas to the erotic, and which the artist claimed possessed telepathic powers.

In October 1991 Valasti disappeared from his prison cell and was never found.