Sisu Production Journal: Finland, part 1: Karelia (Kuhmo and Joensuu)

portrait of Tom Sukanen, done in Joensuu

It's now April 15th and I am posting from Helsinki, Finland. I have been in Karelia, specifically the towns of Kuhmo (KOOHH-mo -- you pronounce the 'H') and Joensuu (yo-AYN-suuu -- you make the 'u' sound longer because there are two of them). In Kuhmo I spent a whole day soaking up Kalevala imagery and Karelian culture at Juminkeko, a small but very well-stocked institute focusing on the Kalevala and the Karelian culture, located in a very beautiful little building designed by one of Finland's top architects.

Juminkeko, Kuhmo

Markku and Sirpa Niemenen, the directors of Juminkeko. I stupidly forgot to take their pictures so had to do this painting from memory later.

wall 'o' Kalevala

I learned a great deal about Karelian culture and probably the thing that intrigued me the most was learning of the movement in Finnish art history known as Karelianism, which was really inspired mostly by the work of Gallen-Kallela, perhaps the most famous of all of the Kalevala illustrators, who lived for a time in Karelia in the late 1890s. From what I have heard, Finns primarily associate his work with the Kalevala, above all other artists.

these are unfortunately not the best quality, but Gallen-Kallela's work is really stunning, with rich colors and a lot of contrast, really gorgeous stuff

Other work that I may end up drawing on for inspiration while I design the Kalevala animations for Sisu includes these block prints from another illustrator:

I also got lots of pictures and drawings of various examples of Karelian design, architecture, and motif, such as these images which I found both at Juminkeko and at Joensuu's excellent Carelicum museum, where I spent the entire day completely alone wandering from dark room to dark room. There is something both magical and creepy about being the only person in a very dark and very large museum. It was a great day.

One of the bits of information I picked up at the Carelicum was the name of a group of women who do rune singing, that is, the type of performance used when reciting the Kalevala, among other traditional poems and stories. Me Naiset ('us women') does beautiful work and I am hoping that there might be a chance I could get some of their music for the film. You can scroll down to hear samples of two of the songs on their latest album on this page to get an idea...

walking sticks and one of many great sketches by Gallen-Kallela

window motif from a Karelian house

birdhouses? the book was in Finnish, so I'm guessing...

model of an old Karelian ship

lace detail from a Karelian married woman's head covering

I also got a chance to do a lot of watercolor and pencil studies of the museum pieces and artifacts, as well as copy some of the motifs and designs from some of the Kalevala books; here is a small selection...

various motif from the Gallen-Kallela version of the Kalevala

a birch-bark shoe, "favored by smiddens burners" and an accordion, both 19th century

details from married women's costumes from Southern Karelia

In addition, I have generally been soaking up Finnish farm architecture and other small details for the parts of the film that feature buildings that Tom might build on his Saskatchewan farm. All of these small watercolors (below) were done based on buildings I zipped past on the train.