I have not been online for a week, because made a trip to Southwestern Finland,
to Kustavi and Turku. Visited many interesting museums, old churches and
other places of interest. I have a great amount of photos and experiences to share
in the coming weeks. Today I’ll share a previous museum visit to Didrichsen Art Museum
which presented Tove Jansson as painter.
Family, 1942
TO PAINT IS TO BE, DIDRICHSEN ART MUSEUM, HELSINKI
The Didrichsen Art Museum on Kuusisaari (Helsinki) is always a great place to visit. Designed by architect Viljo Revell, the modern building has a beautiful location and the sculpture park features sculptures by world-famous artists. I went to see the exhibition To paint is to be, which presented Tove Jansson (1914-2001) as painter. The general public knows Jansson best as the creator, author, and illustrator of Moomin characters, but the multi-talented Jansson often emphasized that she was primarily a painter. Her most significant visual art productions include public commissioned works and decorative paintings for Aurora Children's Hospital, schools and kindergartens, among others.
In the 1930s, Jansson studied at the School of Art and Design in Stockholm, at the School of Drawing of the Finnish Art Association in Helsinki, and completed her studies in Paris. At the heart of the exhibition were the early years of her career at the turn of the 1930s and 1940s, as well as a period of artistic renewal in the late 1950s and 1960s, when the artist's works reflected an increasingly simplified form and controlled composition. In the 1960s, Jansson also experimented with a completely abstract expression. Personally, I liked Jansson’s early works the most, with a broken color palette.
Jansson rose to success in the 1940s when the first Moomin books were published. Through bohemian, tolerant, and humorous moomins, Jansson has also addressed difficult topics such as loneliness, inadequacy, and death. The philosophy of Moomin books has given a lot to adult readers as well, and Jansson was a skilled illustrator of the roles of children and adults throughout her production. Jansson is one of Finland's most read and well-known writers. Her works, especially Moomin books, have been translated into 45 languages and she is Finland's most translated author. In addition, there are several theatre, opera, film, television and radio productions with the moomins.
Paradise
Lanscape, 1930s
On the left blue self-portrait of Eva Cederström. They studied at the same time in Helsinki.
Smoking girl, self-portrait, 1940
Self-portrait, 1942
Astrid / Le monde de Kitchi has written an in-depth post about
the life and art of Tove Jansson in German.
The sculpture park of the Didrichsen Art Museum contains works e.g. from the following sculptors: Henry Moore, Mario Negri, Bernard Meadows, Eila Hiltunen, Laila Pellinen and Eero Hiironen. In addition to the sculptures in the museum's own collections, there are also occasional works lent to the museum. Björn Weckström’s (b. 1935) works can now be seen in the sculpture park. The sculptures anticipate the exhibition - Man, Machine and Jewelery, which opens on September 11, 2021.
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