<   | info | press releases | > press release october 25, 2006

Alvar Aalto Museum celebrates 40^th jubilee

The beginnings of the Alvar Aalto Museum go back four decades to the 1960s. Since the 1950s, the architect had frequently come to Jyväskylä. The impetus for the city's evolving cultural life came in part from the yearly Jyväskylä Cultural Event (later known as Jyväskylä Summer), where Aalto, too, often spoke about architecture and design. When the Pedagogical Polytechnic became Jyväskylä University in 1965, and a professorship and assistantship in Art History were established a year later, hope was born that the city would have its own art museum. The idea took root that an Alvar Aalto institute, academy, or other pedagogical institution bearing his name, should be established. While Aalto was favourable to the idea, his hope was that museum would not portray just a single individual but would be a universal, living art museum.

An association called Alvar Aalto Museum Society - Jyväskylä Art Collections was established on October 24, 1966, in Jyväskylä. The primary aim of the association was to bring about and maintain an art museum in the city. The Museum's scope was wide-ranging from the outset as it included architecture, the fine arts and industrial art. Additionally, the association's duties included "arranging art education, promoting art and supporting the teaching of art, especially in Jyväskylä University". The official opening was on November 26, 1967, and the first exhibition, staged in the Museum of Central Finland, was opened in spring 1968.

The City of Jyväskylä gave the Museum Society temporary use of the Seminaarinkatu 1 premises, a building in which architect Toivo Salervo (1888-1977) had resided. It was subsequently converted by volunteer labour into exhibition space in accordance with drawings and specifications prepared by Aalto's office. This was the building in which Aalto had started his career in architecture - he had been an apprentice in Salervo's office in summer 1916, before starting his architectural studies in Helsinki. At summer's end, Salervo offered some friendly advice to Aalto as an older man: "You'll never make an architect. Aim for a career in journalism instead!" The Alvar Aalto Museum was opened in the renovated space in 1969 and its first exhibition presented Aalto's recent architecture in and around Jyväskylä.

The City of Jyväskylä allowed the Alvar Aalto Museum Society to commission Aalto to produce an overall plan for the Ruusupuisto block and drawings for the future museum. The architect donated the drawings of the museum building to the Society in 1971. Construction was completed in spring 1973, and the building was officially opened in September. Following Aalto's plan, the surroundings on the sloping site included garden lighting and flowing pools of water. In conjunction with the dip in the site between the two museums, Aalto designed a stepped pool that was earlier fed by a natural stream. The Museum's foreground features a memorial to Päivö Oksala by Veikko Hirvimäki entitled Pro Artibus Humanis (1982).

An active five years as an architecture and art museum supported by the city was followed by the transfer of the museum to the City of Jyväskylä and its renaming as the Regional Art Museum of Central Finland in 1981. More and more emphasis was given as time went on to architecture and the Alvar Aalto tradition. In 1997, the art museum split off as a separate entity. Management of the Alvar Aalto Museum, which focused on architecture and design, was transferred to the Alvar Aalto Foundation in 1998.