The Age of Symbolism

The Symbolism of the 1890s affected Finnish artists deeply, its ideas eliciting responses of many kinds on several levels. A line of Symbolism issuing from National Romanticism had followed its own course in the art of Akseli Gallen-Kallela, taking the form of mythologically and mystically based material symbolism as exemplified by Lemminkäinen's Mother and The Fratricide.

Another line, of which Magnus Enckell was the leader, was Paris-centred and had its roots in international sources. A yearning for a distant, pure, ethereal yet absolutely real idea led Symbolist artists in a new direction, away from Realism. The artist aimed at creating a mystery which the viewer was to interpret by using allusions provided by the artist. Artists were tormented by a yearning for a new kind of strange and supernatural beauty, by a desire to be able to guide people to seeing the depths of life. The art of the '90s was feverish and melancholy, touching on disaster and despair.

The new regard for the creative self and the acknowledgement of subconscious forces incited 1890s' artists to acquaint themselves with the 18th century Swedish theosophist Emanuel Swedenborg's theories of the transcendental world, to trying out spiritism, to reading Charles Baudelaire's poetry and listening to Richard Wagner. 1890s Symbolism demanded intimate knowledge and wide reading, and surrendering to totally strange forces.