Tuula Lappalainen was born in Jyvaskyla in central Finland. Parallel to her grammar school studies she enjoyed ballet and acting lessons at the Theatre Academy In Helsinki. Even before taking her A-levels, she was dedicating herself more and more to painting, regularly attending Professor Nandor Mikola’s summer seminar in Orivesi. From him (and from Alvar Aalto, who became interested in her pictures at that time) came the important impulses; it was on their advice that she finally studied at the Finnish State Academy of Art in Helsinki, This was followed by invitations from the art academies of Leningrad, Budapest and Barcelona where she was able to broaden her artistic horizon.
In 1968 she moved to Switzerland, attended the School of Commercial Art and at the same, time studied art history at the university. Moreover she finished her interior decoration studies.
The focal point of her creativity lies in her aquarelle paintings and in many other fields of artistic style in which she states her main interest — art as the expression of beauty, spiritual aesthetics in the sense of a complete work of art. Her pictures adorn restaurants and doctors’ waiting rooms, hospital entrances and public buildings (all designed by her as interior decorator) in all the big cities of Finland and Switzerland. Her speciality is giant murals which give the rooms an additional fascinating dimension. Furthermore she has created a series of art porcelain for the well-known porcelain manufacturer -Arabia” in Helsinki.
Its in the abstract that Tuula Lappalainen reaches the core of her artistic expression — reducing and intensifying the way to intimacy. Music and poetry are important sources of her inspiration, be it the symphonies of Anton Bruckner or the poems of Wilhelm Muller, or even Eino Leino and Lassi Nummi.
Since 2001 Tuula Lappainen has been living and working in the little Spanish town of Oliva on the Mediterranean coast, creating new works inspired by the poems of Garcia Lorca and Juan Ramon Jimenez.