Akseli Gallen-Kallela
The painter of the Kalevala.
Akseli Gallen-Kallela painted Finland’s national epic, the Kalevala, and created a Finnish national imagery. He also designed furniture and textiles.
Akseli Gallen-Kallela was born in 1865 in Pori in Finland, originally named Axel Gallén. The family was Swedish-speaking. He studied in Helsinki and in 1884 went to Paris, where he studied at the Académie Julian and in Fernand Cormon’s studio.
In his early years he painted in a realist style. Boy with a Crow of 1884 is an early example. Yet he wanted to create something distinctly Finnish. On his honeymoon in 1890 he travelled to Karelia, where the old runo songs were still alive, and decided to devote himself to the Kalevala, Finland’s national epic.
During the 1890s he painted the pictures that made him Finland’s national artist. The Aino Triptych of 1891, Lemminkäinen’s Mother of 1897 and Kullervo Cursing of 1899 are in the Ateneum in Helsinki. The Defence of the Sampo of 1896 belongs to the Turku Art Museum. His style became increasingly stylised, with strong outlines, flat areas of colour and decorative patterns. In 1895 his little daughter Impi died, and his grief can be felt in several works from that time.
He built a studio in the wilderness at Ruovesi and turned his hand to everything from printmaking and furniture to textiles and glass. He exhibited with Edvard Munch in Berlin in 1895 and painted frescoes for the Finnish pavilion at the 1900 Exposition Universelle in Paris. He also painted frescoes in the Jusélius Mausoleum in Pori. In 1909–1910 he stayed in East Africa and painted boldly coloured pictures there.
In 1907 he officially changed his name to the Finnish form Akseli Gallen-Kallela. After Finnish independence he designed decorations and uniforms for the new state. He died in 1931 in Stockholm on his way home from a journey. His studio home, Tarvaspää in Espoo, is now a museum, and he is regarded as the foremost visual interpreter of Finnish national identity.