Salo Markku
Salo Markku
Markku Salo (born 1954) is a Finnish industrial designer, who graduated from Helsinki’s University of Art and Design in 1979. He is known as a bold and experimental glass artist, who designs unique art glass as well as pieces for serial production. The latter are characterized by disciplined functionality, simple form and streamlined beauty.
After graduation Salo worked for the late Salora, a Finnish company manufacturing electronics, followed by a career at Nuutajärvi glass factory, the predecessor of Iittala. The renowned glass artist Oiva Toikka hired him as a designer for the factory even though Salo had no experience in working with glass. Markku Salo has also become known as a graphic designer, a ceramicist and an installation artist. For Arabia he has designed the Kayak bowl, an exquisite object made of white bone china. Salo has his own gallery at Nuutajärvi, which displays his one-of-a-kind pieces of glass art.
Markku Salo has received several awards such as the Georg Jensen Award in 1990 and State Industrial Arts Award in 1989. His work is included in Finnish and international museum collections, for example in Victoria and Albert Museum in London, Nationalmuseum in Stockholm, Röhsska Museum in Göteborg and Cooper-Hewitt Museum in New York.