Ausstellung: Tom of Finland

[Hans]

Tom of Finland
21-06-2006 - Finnguide


Tom of Finland
21 Jun - 27 Aug 2006 Kluuvi Gallery

This summer the Kluuvi Gallery will offer a unique opportunity to see the art of Tom of Finland, one of Finland's internationally best-known artists and a transformer of homosexual visual culture. The exhibition will include 90 works from mainly Finnish and also Dutch and Swedish private collections. Most of the drawings and lithographs will be on public display for the first time. The exhibition will also include classic works.

Born in Kaarina in western Finland in 1920, Touko Laaksonen earned worldwide fame under the name Tom of Finland. He died in 1991. Tom of Finland's drawings have had a strong influence on erotic art and they have been an inspiration to innumerable artists around the world. He created a new image of a masculine homosexual man who is comfortable with himself and proud of what he is.

His works convey a positive gay identity and are self-ironic and humorous, as is typical of subcultures. He called his works 'dirty pictures' and was astonished that people were so interested in them. In the postscript of his biography, he commented on his own objectives: "I hope that in the future even those who are different will be accepted, not only gays but all people in the world with all their differences. I have worked for this goal all my life."

Tom of Finland's works are in the collections of, for example, the Museum of Modern Art in New York and the Museum of Contemporary Art Kiasma. Two exhibitions on Tom of Finland's art have been previously organised in Finland, one in Helsinki and the other in Jyväskylä. Both took place in the 1990s. They showed works from the collection of the Tom of Finland Foundation in Los Angeles.

This exhibition is organised in collaboration with MSC Finland - Tom's Club. In conjunction with the exhibition, the Helsinki City Art Museum and the publishing company Like will publish the book Tom of Finland: Ennennäkemätöntä - Unforeseen.

source: Helsinki City Art Museum, Kluuvi Gallery