FINLAND
Architecture / Painting / Sculpture / Applied Arts
Wendy Hall [text extracts]
Wendy Hall [text extracts]: FINLAND [Architecture / Painting / Sculpture / Applied Arts]. Washington, DC: Embassy of Finland, [1957]. Text in English. Slim square quarto. Photo illustrated stapled wrappers. 24 pp. 27 black and white and duotone illustrations. Cover artwork by Tapio Wirkkala. Glossy wrappers lightly handled, but a very good or better copy.
8.5 x 8.5 stapled booklet with 24 pages and 27 black and white and duotone illustrations of the Architecture, Painting, Sculpture, and Applied Arts of Finland. Features text extracted from “Green Gold and Granite” by Wendy Hall [London: Max Parrish, 1957]. A beautifully designed piece of ephemera published by the Embassy of Finland—the best type of propaganda.
Includes work by Tapio Wirkkala, Eliel Saarinen, Alvar Aalto, Timo Sarpeneva, Ilmari Tapiovaara, Rut Bryk, Kirsti Ilvessalo, Kaj Franck, Aune Siimes, Friedl Kjellberg, and others.
From the Design Forum Finalnd website: The Finnish Society of Crafts and Design was founded in 1875, when Finland was still under Russian control. The founders of the society were a group of influential people in the cultural arena and captains of industry. Examples were sought among Europe's foremost schools of industrial arts and crafts.
At first the society maintained a school which taught manual skills and assembled a collection of international industrial arts and crafts. On the initiative of a founder of the society, Professor of Aesthetics Carl Gustaf Estlander, a major new construction project was carried out together with the Finnish Fine Arts Association. The building which resulted from this, the Ateneum, became a museum and institute of education for Finnish fine art and industrial arts.
Gradually the school grew and won an established place as the leading Finnish college in its field. In 1965 it became owned by the Finnish state and it later became a university, the University of Art and Design Helsinki. Today it is the School of Arts, Design and Architecture of the Aalto University. The society also founded the Museum of Art and Design, which after an eventful history became owned by an independent foundation in 1989. Today it is called Design Museum.
The history of the society also includes the famous Finnish sections at Milan Triennales in the 1950s and '60s, the golden age of Finnish design, when many prestigious designers won awards and international fame with their products. The society also actively arranged touring exhibitions of Finnish and Nordic design. The best-known of these toured the USA in the 1950s and Australia and Asia in the 1960s. International activities have therefore always played an important part in the society's work.
After divesting itself of the school and museum, the society turned its efforts in a new direction. At the end of the 1980s, a new, international name was adopted, Design Forum Finland. The core business was to promote design among small and medium-sized industry as well as international operations. Operations settled down in the form of exhibitions in Finland and abroad, publicity and communications, publications, competitions and awards.