Akseli Gallen-Kallela

Akseli Gallen-Kallela (1865-1931) is regarded as one of Finland’s most famous artists, notably shaping the identity of his country with a group of friends known as the “Young Finland circle,” which included Jean Sibelius and composer/conductor Robert Kajanus. This nationalist group met to discuss art, culture, and politics—which was preserved in Gallen-Kallela’s 1894 painting Symposion. Charles Burchfield learned about Gallen-Kallela by reading the English translation of Karl Ekman’s biography, Jean Sibelius – His Life and Personality that was published by Alfred A. Knopf in 1938. 

Ad Astra was Akseli Gallen-Kallela’s private altarpiece, a symbolic image of the transcendental continuation of life after death. He also designed and carved the decorative cabinet with gilded doors. He drew inspiration for the painting from the Christian Bible as well as Finland’s national epic, the Kalevala, resulting in an iconic work that is a national treasure. It has been written that “his primary objective as a painter was to invent a Finnish tradition and visually universalize the Kalevalian cosmos.”