Annukka Mikkola

Annukka Mikkola is a material-driven textile artist, designer and art educator whose work brings together Finnish craft tradition, Japanese culture and contemporary art thinking. She's drawn to the dialogue between old and new, to fragments and fragmentary form, to the shifting tones of natural light, and to the way textiles can build entirely different states of mind.

Mikkola's career as a textile designer began in the 1990s, designing rugs, wall hangings and other interior textiles for names including Suomen Käsityön Ystävät, Wetterhoff, VM Carpet and Pirkanmaan Kotityö. Her long-standing dialogue with Japanese culture, rooted in her research into Edo-period textile history, has shaped a body of work where Finnish and Japanese craft traditions don't sit in opposition, but form a living bridge between past and present. In Finarte's 40th anniversary rag rug competition in 2025, Mikkola received a special mention for Marikko & Karikko, a pair of hand-woven rugs that give the traditional Finnish rag rug a new, modern interpretation — Marikko drawing on Scandinavian form, Karikko referencing the historic trade routes that carried rug-making traditions north. Marikko & Karikko are now part of the 2026 collection.