Years 1963–1975 - Design Forum Finland

Design takes a stand 1963–1975

The early years of the Society 1875–1900
Exhibition activities begin 1932–1939
The birth of Finnish Design 1951–1959
Design takes a stand 1963–1975
Finland Designs and Design Forum is established 1979–1993
Classics and new trends 1993–2000
The turn of the millennium 2001–2006
Internationalisation initiatives 2007–2010
Years of major projects 2010–2015
Strategy changes 2015–

1963

In autumn 1963, Martti Vuorenjuuri, the director of domestic operations at the Finnish Society of Crafts and Design, produced on Tesvisio TV canal a regular TV programme that told internationally about the problems of design.

The project was related to the fact that the Finnish Society of Craft and Design’s operations had picked up, and it is an interesting part of the active and contemporary communications policy of the society in the 1960s. Normal communications operations naturally included press releases and press conferences related to domestic and foreign exhibitions and other events organised by the society.

From the beginning of the 1950s to the end of the 1970s, the Finnish Society of Crafts and Design collected a lot of newspaper articles about Finnish design. Through the press clipping service of the Finnish Cultural Foundation, 1,537 of these articles were collected in 1963.

1968

The 14th Triennale di Milano had barely been open for two hours when radical protestors and students occupied the Triennale palace. They shouted: Triennale is dead, Triennale is closed, Milan is Paris!

The building’s walls were vandalised with slogans and exhibition artefacts were destroyed and stolen. The exhibition had to be closed down and it remained closed for three weeks. No prizes were awarded.

‘The Large Number’ had been selected as the theme of the exhibition, referring to the big societal changes in the sectors of architecture and design, among others. However, in Europe’s volatile summer of 1968, protestors deemed the exhibition to be fascist and capitalistic. According to them, the Triennale did not respond to the world’s big issues, such as famine and poverty.

Yrjö Kukkapuro was Finland’s exhibition architect, and the section was bathed in bright colours, pursuant to the theme of ‘Human and colour.’The vast majority of the products were everyday objects, but there were also 60s jewellery art and unique glass and ceramics artefacts.

A committee, led by H. O. Gummerus, the Director of the Finnish Society of Crafts and Design and the exhibition commissioner of Finland’s section, began to ponder the Triennale’s future and need for a change.

1968–1969

A new version of the Design in Scandinavia exhibition toured Australia from 1968 to 1969. The first exhibition venue was Western Australian Art Gallery in Perth in February–March 1968.

The Nordic countries were represented at the opening ceremony by H. O. Gummerus, Managing Director of the Finnish Society of Crafts and Design, who was the prime mover of the entire exhibition project. The last exhibition was seen in Canberra at the turn of the year 1968–1969.

The exhibition architect was Antti Nurmesniemi, who also designed the exhibition catalogue and poster. The catalogue text was written by the Swedish journalist Ulf Hård af Segerstad, who also wrote a great deal about Finnish design. The general secretary of the exhibition was Ulla Tarras-Wahlberg. She toured with the exhibition to all seven exhibition sites. Later in her career, she acted as the director of both the Swedish and Norwegian applied arts associations.

The exhibition attracted a lot of attention and was visited by a total of 200,000 visitors. Sales exhibitions were held in department stores. Australian TV and radio broadcast more than five hours of programming on the exhibition, and the exhibition was accompanied by presentations on the Scandinavian lifestyle, society and economy. The exhibition included 23 companies and 43 designers from Finland.

Photo: West Australian Newspapers Ltd.

1973

At Finland’s suggestion, the Nordic countries participated in the 1973 Triennale di Milano with a joint section. The theme of the exhibition was ‘The Child’s Environment’ and the exhibition architect was architect Tapio Periäinen.

Tapio Periäinen compiled the exhibition material together with experts from the applied arts organisations of Sweden, Norway and Denmark. Later, he worked as the Managing Director of the Finnish Society of Crafts and Design in 1975–1994.

The exhibition was an ideological and declaratory themed exhibition. Its aim was to present the relationship between the child and the environment and the solutions for this found in Scandinavia. The exhibition space was a kind of playroom, dominated by big balls and sculptures by Rauni Liukko. They were complemented by wall texts and slideshows. The huge balls inspired children to play, and the schoolchildren who came to the Triennale went outright berserk, as exhibition hostess Elisabeth Stenius stated in her report.

The Triennale was attended by a total of 100,000 visitors. The Nordic section was the only foreign section to receive a Grand Prix. In connection with the Triennale, the 50th anniversary exhibition of the Triennale was also organised, to which 22 Finnish participants had been invited.

Photo:Public Photo Milan

1975

The 100th anniversary of the Finnish Society of Crafts and Design was celebrated in a grand style.

On the day of the founding of the society, 29 October, at 10 am, an anniversary meeting was held at the society’s premises at Unioninkatu 30, to which the members of the society’s administrative bodies had been invited. The meeting was chaired by Jussi Saukkonen, chairperson of the administrative board of the Finnish Society of Crafts and Design.

The meeting announced the establishment of the 100th anniversary foundation of the Finnish Society of Crafts and Design. The task of the new foundation was to support and promote the Finnish applied arts field in its entirety. Managing Director H. O. Gummerus was invited as an honorary member of the society. After the anniversary meeting, the society received congratulations.

The official 100th anniversary celebration was held in the Assembly Hall of the University of Helsinki on the evening of 29 October 1975, and the President of the Republic, Urho Kekkonen, honoured the celebration with his presence. The 100th anniversary celebrations also included an extensive history exhibition “100 vuotta suomalaista taideteollisuutta” (100 years of Finnish applied arts), which was on display at the Ateneum Art Museum from 31 October to 7 December. The exhibition architecture was designed by Antti Nurmesniemi.

The 100-year history of the society, “Finnish Design 1875–1975”, was written by Erik Kruskopf, and the graphic design of the book was executed by Timo Sarpaneva and Erik Bruun. Sarpaneva also designed a commemorative stamp. The anniversary year of the society was extensively covered in both the domestic and foreign press, and at the same time the current state and future of Finnish design were discussed.

Photo: Krister Katva