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| Lallukka Artists' Home |
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Lallukka Artists' Home was donated by Juho and Maria LallukkaIn early 1933 a grand new building was completed on top of the Apollo rocks in the Helsinki suburb of Etu-Töölö. The functionalist building, which was designed by architect Gösta Juslén, has an impressive exterior appearance that attracted attention.A testament signed by the benefactor couple Juho and Maria Lallukka in 1908 specified that the building was to become a home for devotees of art. The testament came into force when the longest living of the couple, Maria, passed away in 1923. When the testament was prepared in the early 1900s, the drafters could hardly have foreseen the future shape of Finland: an independent and wealthy nation state with a highly developed society and welfare system. It was the Lallukka's close contact with artists and their daily routines in Vyborg in early 20th century Finland that inspired their belief that artists required freedom from worries about housing and food, in order to best nurture their creative abilities. The Lallukka's vision was for an artists' refuge, where artists could focus on their own line of art and develop their talents without interruption. This vision laid the foundations for the continuing rise of Finnish art. The Lallukka Artists' Home is the centre of dedication to hard work and lifelong development. Ageing artists are not expelled from the home, even though it is not an old people's home. For the entire period of its operation, the Lallukka Artists' Home Foundation donated by Juho and Maria Lallukka has held on to the axiom that the Lallukka Artists' Home is for professional artists. In the selection of resident artists, two equal applicants are evaluated also from the social perspective with respect to the idea of a refuge by the donators of the Artists' Home. Many of the residents' spouses are also significant artists. The original allocation of the Artists' Home reserved 20 rooms for visual artists and 25 rooms for other artists specified by the bylaws of the Foundation; there were three apartments for staff. The current allocation of rooms is as follows: visual artists, 2507 m², 24 ateliers dramatic artists, 898 m², 14 apartments composers, 965 m², 13 apartments 51 artists' residences in total |