Excerpts of messages from Pentti’s family and friends

Read at memorial on 12 February:

We loved Pentti with all our heart, we have lost a brother, we have lost a friend, an enormous bereavement has flowed through us

Your support for our family has given us strength to try to overcome deep bereavement.

You were the jewel in the crown of Pentti's life.

Your dealings with Pentti were the fundamental foundation for his activities and his life.

You were Pentti's inspirers, promoters and friends.

Our deepest thanks to You

Today, Pentti has left us, however his memory will stay with us forever.

Pentti’s eldest son Janne identified brothers and sisters on day of memorial in Finland:

My uncles are Pekka, Juhanni, Mauri, Timo, Aunts are Katarina & Marjatta. My  grandmother is Eeva. My mother Marja will be there also. I wish we could be at the event as well, I know it will be beautiful. Note: Eeva now lives in Oulu, she did not attend.

From Urho Lempinen’s about the Helsinki memorial on February 3:

It was a moving memorial that will remain in the minds of all of us who were fortunate enough to be able to attend. After opening words, welcome and his recollection by Mr. Berndt Arell, Director of the Kiasma Museum of Modern Arts, several distingushed speakers described their personal friendship with Pentti. Speakers included, among others, Jorma Ollila, Chairman of Nokia and Shell, Björn Wahlroos, Chairman of Sampo Group, Mario Draghi, Governor of Bank of Italy, Ms. Lenita Airisto, Lady Elena Foster, Philosopher Esa Saarinen and Father Ambrosius. Uniform in all of these accounts was the portrait of a man of great intelligence and creativity, of enormous artistic vision and capacity, of huge scope of interests ranging from deep science to everyday human life, but in particular of a great friend and supporter. Lenita Airisto said that after having been introduced to Pentti some 25 years ago, they had spoken over the phone literally on every day since then until early January this year. Esa Saarinen said that in Pentti he lost one of the finest men he has ever had the priviledge of knowing, a man who was able to lift up his friends through his optimism despite of having received huge repeated knock-out blows and dismeriting especially in Finland throughout the last 15 years. It can be understood in this last perspective, why it was so important and moving to Pentti that his modern arts collection was officially named the Pentti Kouri Collection of Kiasma in last October.

 

I hope we all keep in our hearts and minds this vision of a great man, instilled from the accounts of his closest friends.