Gustaf Marcus Collin (18 November 1882,

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 ...

– 22 September 1966,

Kauniainen Kauniainen (; ) is a town in Finland, located in the southern interior of the country. Kauniainen is situated in the southern part of the Uusimaa region, and it is Enclave and exclave, enclaved by the City of Espoo. The population of Kauniainen ...

) was an artist from

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, ...

. He was one of the central members of the Novemberists, a group of Finnish

expressionists Expressionism is a modernist movement, initially in poetry and painting, originating in Northern Europe around the beginning of the 20th century. Its typical trait is to present the world solely from a subjective perspective, distorting it radi ...

. Collin was born in Helsinki to an educated, Swedish-speaking family. His father was a civil servant. His future as an artist was not at first obvious. He studied law, but did not want to become a civil servant in the Finland as A Grand Duchy ruled by Russia. He worked as a journalist, and tried to study architecture, but found the mathematics classes too challenging. Then he changed his studies to study art, first in Helsinki, later in

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

. He made four extended trips in continental Europe, and on his fourth visit to Paris he enrolled in

Académie Ranson The Académie Ranson was a private art school founded in 1908 in Paris by the French painter Paul Ranson (1862–1909). History The Académie Ranson was founded in 1908 by Paul Ranson (1862–1909), who himself studied at the Académie Jul ...

, where he was taught by

Paul Sérusier Paul Sérusier (; 9 November 1864 – 7 October 1927) was a French painter who was a pioneer of abstract art and an inspiration for the avant-garde Nabis movement, Synthetism and Cloisonnism. Education Sérusier was born in Paris. He studie ...

. Sérusier drew his attention to composition, and for a while even the use of colour in Collin's work showed the influence of Sérusier. The paintings of life in the Finnish archipelago, painted in bright colours, were Collin's final breakthrough as an artist. Collin became a member of group of artists led by Tyko Sallinen. The group later took the name November Group. In middle of the 1910-decade the group started to use more ascetic palettes, and Collin's colour palette was the most minimal of them all. He only used a few dark shades. After 1921, Collin gradually abandoned his gray and brown palette by adding more bright colours. When he became older, his style became more realistic. Collin is known for his paintings of people. Many of these illustrate literature, such as the

Aleksis Kivi Aleksis Kivi (; born Alexis Stenvall; 10 October 1834 – 31 December 1872) was a Finnish writer who wrote the first significant novel in the Finnish language, '' Seitsemän veljestä'' (''Seven Brothers''), published in 1870. He is also known ...

novel ''

Seitsemän veljestä ''Seitsemän veljestä'' (; literally translated ''The Seven Brothers'', or ''The Brothers Seven'' in Douglas Robinson's 2017 translation) is the first and only novel by Aleksis Kivi, the national author of Finland.Miguel de Cervantes Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra ( ; ; 29 September 1547 (assumed) – 22 April 1616 Old Style and New Style dates, NS) was a Spanish writer widely regarded as the greatest writer in the Spanish language and one of the world's pre-eminent novelist ...

novel ''

Don Quixote , the full title being ''The Ingenious Gentleman Don Quixote of La Mancha'', is a Spanish novel by Miguel de Cervantes. Originally published in two parts in 1605 and 1615, the novel is considered a founding work of Western literature and is of ...

''. He portrayed factory workers and farmhands as faceless representatives of their social class. Collin was given an honorary title of professor in 1953. He received the Swedish

Prince Eugen Medal The Prince Eugen Medal () is a medal conferred by the King of Sweden for "outstanding artistic achievement". The medal was established in 1945 by the then King of Sweden, Gustaf V, in connection with the eightieth birthday of his brother Prince ...

in 1957.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Collin, Marcus 1882 births 1966 deaths Finnish Expressionist painters