The International Museum Day is celebrated today on May 18th and again this year Moomins and Tove Jansson’s art have a strong presence in museums around the world:
Göteborgs Konstmuseum, Sweden
Photo: Göteborgs konstmuseum – Hossein Sehatlou
Tove Jansson’s exhibition has been touring Europe from autumn 2016 onwards. In 2014, to celebrate the 100th anniversary of Tove Jansson, the exhibition was held in Helsinki at the Art Museum Ateneum. Over 300 000 people visited the exhibition in Finland, and during 2015, the touring exhibition in Japan delighted over 260 000 visitors in a total of five museums. The Europe tour began in Stockholm, Sweden in October 2016, and the exhibition is now exhibited at the Göteborgs Konstmuseum, Gothenburg, Sweden.
The exhibition covers all the periods in Tove Jansson’s (1914–2001) productive career, including her surrealistic paintings of the 1930s, modernist art of the 1950s and more abstract works in the 1960s and ‘70s, as well as her satirical anti-war illustrations for the magazine Garm, her monumental paintings for public spaces, and of course Moomin characters and stories.
Exhibition in Gothenburg will be open until May 21st, 2017, continuing to GL Strand, Copenhagen (10 Jun. 2017 ~ 3 Sept. 2017).
Tove Jansson – Lusten att skapa och leva, Göteborgs Konstmuseum, Gothenburg, Sweden
Southbank Centre, England
Photo: Vic Frankowski
The exhibition at the Southbank Centre’s Royal Festival Hall presents new insights into Tove Jansson’s life and the influences behind her work with rare archive objects and illustrations built into the experience. The show is part of Nordic Matters – a year-long exploration of Nordic art and culture at Southbank Centre throughout 2017.
The exhibition displays objects never-before exhibited in the UK: from original illustration; artworks and 3D models; to letters and personal items from Tove’s studio in Helsinki and her family island of Klovharu, where she lived for almost thirty years.
The exhibition in London will be open until August 20th, 2017.
Adventures in Moominland, Southbank Centre, London, England
Helsinki Art Museum – Finland
Since early 2016, Helsinki Art Museum, HAM, has showcased the work and life of Tove Jansson by creating permanent displays of works from the collections of HAM. In the new hanging, Jansson’s frescoes Party in the City and Party in the Countryside and her sketches of murals for the Aurora Children’s Hospital are recently joined by Tove’s murals for the canteen at the Pitäjänmäki factory of the Strömberg company, as well as lamps by designer Paavo Tynell, which were featured in the original venue of the frescoes, the Kaupunginkellari restaurant in Helsinki.
If you don’t have a chance to visit the exhibition in the centre of Helsinki, you can see copies of the frescoes Party in the City and Party in the Countryside at the Helsinki Airport in terminal 2 until the end of July. Fresco copies are located in the Non-Schengen area, at the gate 32a. In order to see the works, you need a ticket to long-haul flight or flight ticket to a Non-Schengen European country.
Theatre Museum – Finland
A part of Moominvalley is presented at the Theatre Museum in Helsinki, Finland. The exhibition Moomins at the theatre is about theatre performances of Moomins as well as Tove Jansson’s other theatre works. The exhibition displays very unique material from the very first Moomin theatre plays where Tove also designed the costumes and stage settings. The beautiful exhibition also features stunning original costume sketches and costumes by Tove Jansson from the Swedish Theatre drama. The costumes from the Finnish National Opera and Helsinki City Theatre plays are also presented at the exhibition, and pictures can be used to compare the performances.
The exhibition in Helsinki will be open until September 17th, 2017.
Aichi Prefectural Museum of Art, Japan
To celebrate Finland’s 100th anniversary of independence, the Finnish Design Exhibition in Japan started touring in January 2017. The exhibition introduces the history of Finnish design from independence to the present. It concentrates on Finnish designers who have worked in harmony between nature and humans, creating simple work that continues to be loved around the world. Tove Jansson’s Moomins and Arabia’s Moomin mugs are also featured at the exhibition.
Exhibition in Aichi Prefectural Museum of Art, Japan will be open until May 28th, 2017, continuing to Fukui City Museum (22 Jul. 2017 ~ 3 Sept. 2017).
Finnish Design Exhibition, Aichi Prefectural Museum of Art, Japan
COMING SOON:
Moomin Museum – Finland
Tampere Art Museum Moominvalley was closed in October 2016 and now the museum will move to Tampere Hall and change its name to Moomin Museum. The Moomin Museum will be opened on June 17th, 2017.
Moomin Museum is based on the works Tove Jansson donated for Tampere Art Museum in 1986. The collection consists of over 2000 original artworks that Tove Jansson and her partner Tuulikki Pietilä created during their career. The new Moomin Museum presents Tove Jansson’s unique collection in a modern, experiential and multisensory way.