Collaboration on PhD thesis inspires new Alvar Aalto Museum exhibition

A new exhibition at Studio Aalto takes viewers on a journey into the works of architects for whom Aalto’s office was a springboard to fame. The exhibition is based on Miguel Borges de Araújo’s forthcoming PhD thesis, which uses material from the Alvar Aalto Museum’s collections. “The work of Alvar Aalto’s collaborators – the architects Jaakko Kontio, Kaarlo Leppänen and Eric Adlercreutz” opens to the public on Wednesday, May 7, at the Studio Aalto in Helsinki.

“The items in the exhibition are from the latter half of the 1960s. This was an important time for Finnish architecture. The theory of Functionalism was in crisis and Alvar Aalto was still very active, but the young architects who learnt their profession in Aalto’s office each found success in their own different directions”, says Chief Curator at the Alvar Aalto Museum Mia Hipeli.

The scions of Aalto’s office under the spotlight are Jaakko Kontio, Kaarlo Leppänen and Eric Adlercreutz. The exhibition shows the architects immersed in projects that they undertook in the 1960s, and uses their works to explore how the zeitgeist and the years spent under Aalto’s tutelage affected their working processes. Of Kontio’s projects, on display here is Lappeenranta University of Technology, of Leppänen’s works Valkeakoski Cultural and Administrative Center, and from Adlercreutz the Jägarbacken housing area in Tammisaari.

The exhibition has been put together from the architects’ own collections, from the collections of the Alvar Aalto Museum, the Museum of Finnish Architecture and Lappeenranta University of Technology, and from the archives of the cities of Valkeakoski and Myllysaari. Miguel Borges de Araújo’s photographs provide further insight into the current state of the buildings.

Miguel Borges de Araújo was born in Porto, Portugal, in 1982 and studied architecture at the University of Minho in Guimarães. Having been greatly impressed by Alvar Aalto’s buildings, and now settled in Finland, Borges de Araújo is currently writing his PhD thesis “The work of Alvar Aalto’s collaborators” at the School of Architecture, Tampere University.

The work of Alvar Aalto’s collaborators– the architects Jaakko Kontio, Kaarlo Leppänen and Eric Adlercreutz
7.5–23.11.2014
Studio Aalto
Tiilimäki 20, Helsinki
www.alvaraalto.fi

Further information:
Producer Mari Forsberg, +358 45 6790920, mari.forsberg@alvaraalto.fi, Alvar Aalto Museum

Photo: Lappeenranta University of Technology (1969) by Jaakko Kontio and Kalle Räike, Valkeakoski Cultural and administrative center (1966) by Kaarlo Leppänen, and Jägarbacken housing in Tammisaari (1967) by Eric Adlercreutz and Nils-Hinrik Aschan.