Gustaf Marcus Collin (18 November 1882,

Helsinki Helsinki ( or ; ; sv, Helsingfors, ) is the Capital city, capital, primate city, primate, and List of cities and towns in Finland, most populous city of Finland. Located on the shore of the Gulf of Finland, it is the seat of the region of U ...

– 22 September 1966,

Kauniainen Kauniainen (; sv, Grankulla) is a small town and a municipality of inhabitants () in the Helsinki Metropolitan Area, Finland. It is surrounded and enclaved by the City of Espoo, in the Capital Region of Greater Helsinki. Kauniainen was founded ...

) was an artist from

Finland Finland ( fi, Suomi ; sv, Finland ), officially the Republic of Finland (; ), is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It shares land borders with Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of B ...

. 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 rad ...

. 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 and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...

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

Académie Ranson The Académie Ranson was founded in Paris by the French painter Paul Ranson (1862–1909), who himself studied at the Académie Julian, in 1908.

, 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 studied a ...

. 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 Tyko Konstantin Sallinen (March 14, 1879 in Nurmes – September 18, 1955 in Helsinki) was a Finnish expressionism style painter. In late 1916 Sallinen became a founder member of the November Group, which was a Finnish group of expressionists and ...

. 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 author who wrote the first significant novel in the Finnish language, ''Seitsemän veljestä'' ("Seven Brothers") in 1870. He is also known for his 1864 p ...

novel ''

Seitsemän veljestä ''Seitsemän veljestä'' (; literally translated ''The Seven Brothers'') is the first and only novel by Aleksis Kivi, the national author of Finland.

'' or the Miguel de Cervantes novel '' Don Quixote''. 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 in 1957.

References

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