- Karelianism
Karelianism was a late 19th century cultural
phenomenon in theGrand Duchy of Finland and involved writers, painters, poets and sculptors. Since the publishing of the Finnish national epicKalevala in 1835, compiled fromKarelia n folk lore, culture spheres inFinland became increasingly curious about Karelian heritage and landscape. By the end of the 19th century Karelianism had become a major trend for many works of art and literature in Finland. In the movement Karelia was seen as a sort of refuge for the essence of "Finnishness" that had maintained its authenticity across centuries. The phenomenon can be interpreted as a Finnish version of Europeannational romanticism .The painters
Akseli Gallen-Kallela andLouis Sparre are usually mentioned as the founders of the movement. They were soon joined by the sculptorEmil Wikström , the writersJuhani Aho ,Eino Leino andIlmari Kianto , the composersJean Sibelius andP.J. Hannikainen , the architectsYrjö Blomstedt andVictor Sucksdorff , and many others [http://www.juminkeko.fi/viena/en/karelianismi.html] . Later, towards theSecond World War , some of the ideas of Karelianism were taken over by an irredentist movement aspiring to create a larger Finland. Thus some of the ideas put forward by Karelianism were used as a motivation to the proposal of aGreater Finland , a single state encompassing manyFinnic people s.ee also
*
Heimosodat
*Romantic nationalism
*Golden Age of Finnish art Further reading
* [http://www.publiscan.fi/wtf02e.htm Welcome to Finland - Culture]
* [http://virtual.finland.fi/netcomm/news/showarticle.asp?intNWSAID=27022 the Kalevala and Karelianism from Virtual Finland]
* [http://www.juminkeko.fi/viena/en/karelianismi.html Info on Karelianism from Juminkeko, a foundation maintaining the Kalevala tradition]
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