Ateneum is an

art museum An art museum or art gallery is a building or space for the display of art, usually from the museum's own Collection (artwork), collection. It might be in public or private ownership, be accessible to all, or have restrictions in place. Although ...

Helsinki Helsinki () is the Capital city, capital and most populous List of cities and towns in Finland, city in Finland. It is on the shore of the Gulf of Finland and is the seat of southern Finland's Uusimaa region. About people live in the municipali ...

Finland Finland, officially the Republic of Finland, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It borders Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of Bothnia to the west and the Gulf of Finland to the south, ...

and one of the three museums forming the Finnish National Gallery. It is located in the centre of Helsinki on the south side of Rautatientori square close to

Helsinki Central railway station Helsinki Central Station (, ) (List of IATA-indexed railway stations, HEC) is the main station for commuter rail and long-distance trains departing from Helsinki, Finland. About 200,000 people "pass through the station" every day, half of whom ar ...

. It has the biggest collections of classical art in Finland. Before 1991 the Ateneum building also housed the Finnish Academy of Fine Arts and

University of Art and Design Helsinki Aalto University School of Arts, Design and Architecture; ; ), was formed of two separate schools: the faculty of architecture (previously part of the Helsinki University of Technology) and the University of Art and Design Helsinki (UIAH, known in ...

Collections

The collections of Ateneum include Finnish art extensively from 18th-century rococo portraiture to the experimental art movements of the 20th century. The collections also include some 650 international works of art. One of them is

Vincent van Gogh Vincent Willem van Gogh (; 30 March 185329 July 1890) was a Dutch Post-Impressionist painter who is among the most famous and influential figures in the history of Western art. In just over a decade, he created approximately 2,100 artworks ...

's ''Street in Auvers-sur-Oise'' (1890), which when deposited to Ateneum in 1903 made it the first museum collection in the world to include a Vincent van Gogh painting. Other notable works include

Albert Edelfelt Albert Gustaf Aristides Edelfelt (21 July 1854 – 18 August 1905) was a Finnish Painting, painter noted for his naturalistic style and Realism (arts), Realist approach to art. He lived in the Grand Duchy of Finland and made Finnish culture visib ...

’s ''The Luxembourg Garden'' (1887),

Akseli Gallen-Kallela Akseli Gallen-Kallela (born Axel Waldemar Gallén; 26 April 1865 – 7 March 1931) was a Finnish painter who is best known for his illustrations of the ''Kalevala'', the Finnish national epic poetry, epic. His work is considered a very importa ...

’s ''Aino Triptych'' (1891),

Eero Järnefelt Erik "Eero" Nikolai Järnefelt (8 November 1863 – 15 November 1937) was a Finnish painter and art professor. He is best known for his portraits and landscapes of the area around Koli National Park, in the North Karelia region of Finland. He wa ...

’s ''Under the Yoke (Burning the Brushwood)'' (1893) and

Hugo Simberg Hugo Gerhard Simberg (24 June 1873 – 12 July 1917) was a Finland, Finnish Symbolism (movement), symbolist painter and graphic artist. Life and career Simberg was born on 24 June 1873, at Hamina (), Finland, the son of Colonel Nicolai Simberg ...

’s '' The Wounded Angel'' (1903).

Notable works

Architecture

The Ateneum building was designed by Theodor Höijer and completed in 1887. The facade of Ateneum is decorated with statues and reliefs which contain a lot of symbols. Above the main entrance, in the second floor, are busts of three famous classical artists: architect

Bramante Donato Bramante (1444 – 11 April 1514), born as Donato di Pascuccio d'Antonio and also known as Bramante Lazzari, was an Italian architect and painter. He introduced Renaissance architecture to Milan and the High Renaissance style to Rom ...

, painter

Raphael Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino (; March 28 or April 6, 1483April 6, 1520), now generally known in English as Raphael ( , ), was an Italian painter and architect of the High Renaissance. List of paintings by Raphael, His work is admired for its cl ...

and sculptor

Phidias Phidias or Pheidias (; , ''Pheidias''; ) was an Ancient Greek sculptor, painter, and architect, active in the 5th century BC. His Statue of Zeus at Olympia was one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. Phidias also designed the statues of ...

. Above the busts, in the third floor, four

caryatid A caryatid ( ; ; ) is a sculpted female figure serving as an architectural support taking the place of a column or a pillar supporting an entablature on her head. The Greek term ''karyatides'' literally means "maidens of Karyai", an ancient t ...

s support the pediment. These symbolize the four classical art forms: sculpture, painting, geometry, and architecture.http://vanderkrogt.net/statues/object.php?webpage=ST&record=fi117 Façade decoration of the Ateneum The facade culminates in a collage of sculptures in which the Goddess of Art, Pallas Athene, blesses the products of the different art forms. Below the pediment's collage is the Latin phrase '' Concordia res parvae crescunt'' (''With concord small things increase''), which is usually understood in Helsinki to refer to the long-lasting battle of the Finnish art circles in order to establish the museum. All the statues were by Carl Eneas Sjöstrand. In between the second floor windows are 16 medallion-style reliefs by Ville Vallgren representing some of Finland's most well known creative people of his day, including painter Aleksander Lauréus, Werner Holmberg and the architect

Carl Ludvig Engel Carl Ludvig Engel or Johann Carl Ludwig Engel (3 July 1778 – 14 May 1840) was a German architect whose most noted work can be found in Helsinki, which he helped rebuild. His works include most of the buildings around the capital's monumental ce ...

. Other ornamental elements were sculpted by

Magnus von Wright Magnus von Wright (13 June 1805 – 5 July 1868) was a Swedish-speaking population of Finland, Swedish-Finnish painter and educator. In addition to bird illustrations, he was also known for his landscapes. He was one of the four sibling Von Wri ...

. The Ateneum building is owned by Senate Properties (), the government real estate provider.

References

External links

Ateneum Art Museum
within

Google Arts & Culture Google Arts & Culture (formerly Google Art Project) is an online platform of high-resolution images and videos of artworks and cultural artifacts from partner cultural organizations throughout the world, operated by Google. It utilizes high-re ...

* {{Helsinki Cityscape 1887 establishments in Finland Museums in Helsinki Art museums and galleries in Finland Art museums and galleries established in 1887 Kluuvi Finnish National Gallery Ateneum

Collections

Notable works

Architecture

See also

References

External links