Magritte & Kupka in Helsinki

There are tens of museums in the Helsinki region and we have this fantastic invention for 4th year now - Museum Card - that opens entrance to 280 museums all around the country. It is valid the whole year and costs 69 €. After visiting approximately four exhibitions, the following are ’free’. My husband gave me Museum Card as a Women’s Day present and I’ll tell you about two art exhibitions that I intend to visit next week. The photos and info come from the sites of these two museums - Ateneum and Amos Rex. I’ll post later on my impressions of the exhibitions.

René Magritte / Amos Rex

The museum shows works of the Belgian painter René Magritte (1898-1967) for the first time in Finland. Magritte, who is considered a leading figure in Surrealism, is particularly known for his works that turn everyday reality upside down; an apple fills a whole room and a nose becomes a pipe. The familiar is suddenly bafflingly strange.

Amos Rex / Wikimedia Commons / Sino Yu

František Kupka / Ateneum

The Czech artist František Kupka (1871–1957) is known as a pioneer of abstract art. The retrospective of the painter, who enjoyed a long career in Paris, will enable viewers to explore the history of Western art: the step-by-step transition from traditional portraiture towards abstract expression. In his powerful and almost psychedelic works, Kupka applied Newton’s colour theory, as well as music theory: you can sense rhythm and movement in his paintings. Three of the exhibition galleries will show Kupka’s works with jazz and classical music playing in the background.

František Kupka: Piano Keys, Lake (1909). National Gallery in Prague. © ADAGP, Paris.

František Kupka: Planes by Colours, Large Nude (1909–1910).

Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York. © ADAGP, Paris.
Photo: © The Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation / Art Resource, NY, Dist. RMN-Grand Palais.

František Kupka: Lipstick II (1908). Centre Pompidou, Musée national d’art moderne, Paris, 

deposited at Strasbourg Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art. 

© ADAGP, Paris. Photo: © Musées de Strasbourg / N. Fussler.

There is a book about Magritte - Lifeline, released in 2018 / Amazon

// MOSAIC MONDAY 

Happy new week for everybody!