Location: Mannerheimintie 34, Helsinki
Tel. 09- 405 09 544
Bus:
40
Trolley: 4, 10
Open: 11am- 8pm Tue- Wed, 11am- 6pm Thu- Sun
Closed: public holidays
www.nba.fi
The National Museum of Finland is a national museum of
cultural history that, in addition to the National Museum,
is responsible for the operations of Hvitträski, Häme
Castle, Langinkoski, Louhisaari, Olavinlinna, Seurasaari
Outdoor Museum, the Finnish Maritime Museum, Tamminiemi and
the Prison. The National Museum presents the history of
Finland from the Stone Age to the present with the help of
object culture. The National Museum of Finland is part of
the Museum Agency under the Ministry of Education and
Culture.
The National Museum of Finland has
collections of about half a million objects, which are
managed by the museum's collection and research unit and the
Collection Center. There are approximately 120 permanent
staff.
The National Museum building is located in
Helsinki's Etu-Töölö along Mannerheimintie, across from
Finlandia Hall. In the architecture of the National Museum,
features of medieval Finnish churches and castles can be
seen in a nationally romantic way. The style of the museum
strongly reflects Art Nouveau and Art Nouveau features.
The National Museum of Finland began in 1887, when the Consistory of
the University of Helsinki asked the senate to take over the collections
of the university's historical-ethnological museum, departments, the
Finnish Antiquities Association and the Antiquities Committee and to
acquire suitable exhibition spaces for them. The collections were
finally transferred to the state in 1893.
In 1888, the
Antiquities Committee handed over to the Senate the plan drawn up by
Eliel Aspelin for the realization of the museum building. The place was
suggested to be Tähtitorn mountain or the northern end of Nikolainkati
(now Snellmaninkatu). Three years later, Sebastian Gripenberg, director
general of the General Board of Public Buildings, prepared a cost
estimate and preliminary drafts, which after changes were approved by
the Diet of 1894. The site of the museum was chosen on the northern
slope of Tähtitorn mountain.
However, in 1895, on the order of
Governor-General Fyodor Heiden and the Senate, a more suitable location
was started for the museum, such as was found in Fjälldal in Töölö. The
Helsinki City Council handed over the plot in the spring of 1898, but
the construction of the museum was further delayed when the new location
caused changes to the drawings and the cost estimate. The new drawings
were completed in 1899, but they were not approved by all parties. The
style of the building was now considered old-fashioned, and at the same
time it was felt that the museum building should be easily expandable as
the collections continue to grow over the decades. In 1901, the senate
announced an architectural competition for the design of the museum
building. The award committee was chaired by the state archaeologist
J.R. Aspelin, and its foreign members were the architects I.G. Clason
and Martin Nyrop. The winner was the design of the architectural office
Gesellius, Lindgren, Saarinen, which was approved by the senate in 1905.
Construction work began that fall, but the unrest of 1905–1907 delayed
the work so that the building was not completed until 1910. However, due
to the scarcity of funding granted by the senate, the interior was not
repaired yet for several years.
The National Museum was opened
only in 1916, when the ethnographic collection and the collection of the
historical period of Finland presenting the upper classes were opened to
the public. In 1920, the Finnish Stone and Bronze Age collections were
opened, and in 1923, the Finnish Iron Age collection, a foreign
prehistoric collection and the ethnographic collection of the
Finno-Ugric peoples were opened. The money collections were only opened
later in the 1920s.
The building of the National Museum was designed by Architects
Gesellius, Lindgren, Saarinen. After the office ceased operations, Eliel
Saarinen continued to design the museum. The look freely imitates
architectural motifs from different eras in Finland, including medieval
churches and castles. The architecture represents national romanticism,
and the interiors are mainly Art Nouveau. The museum was built between
1905 and 1910, and it was opened to the public in 1916. The museum is
built from the gray granite of Uusikaupunki, which was mined, for
example, from the island of Lepäinen. The museum was officially named
the National Museum of Finland after the country's independence in 1917.
After the last major renovation, the museum was opened in July 2000.
On the ceiling of the museum's entrance hall are Kalevala-themed
ceiling frescoes painted by Akseli Gallen-Kallela, which can be viewed
without an admission fee. The frescoes painted in 1928 were modeled on
the frescoes painted by Gallen-Kallela for the Finnish pavilion at the
1900 Paris World Exhibition.
The tower of the National Museum was
renovated in 2017. During the renovation, all the stones of the tower
were photographed, documented, numbered and removed one by one. After
installing the heating cables and building the ventilation ducts, the
stones were reinstalled exactly where they were before, and the gaps
were filled with mortar. The inside of the tower, openings, doors and
balconies were restored. The main door and lighting were conserved.
In 2019, the National Museum, the Museum Agency and Senaatti
Kinteistöt organized an architectural competition for the design of the
museum's annex. The first part of the competition received 185
proposals, from which five plans were selected for the second stage. In
the end, the competition was won by JKMM Architects' work Atlas, whose
facade features glass and massive structures. The exhibition spaces are
underground, and the curved roof of the building can be seen in the
lobby of the underground spaces. It was written into the plans that the
building should be completed in 2025.
The construction of the
extension part will start in autumn 2023 and the museum will be closed
to the public in mid-October for 2–3 years. The construction project is
estimated to cost 55 million euros.
Basic exhibitions
The basic exhibitions of the National Museum
will be completely renewed between 2016 and 2021. The first to be
renovated was the exhibition on prehistory, which opened in a completely
new form on April 1, 2017. The first objects added to the museum
collection from each period of prehistory are displayed in the
exhibition: a hammer ax from the Stone Age, a shoulder ax from the
Bronze Age, and a spearhead from the Iron Age. The exhibition progresses
thematically through objects related to origin, movement, encounter,
materiality and world view. The Finnish Story exhibition about the
period of independence opened at the end of 2017. The exhibition
progresses through loosely chronological themes from the time of
autonomy to the present day. At the end of the exhibition, there is a
display case that presents the recording of this moment, i.e.
contemporary documentation through a current topic. The part of the
exhibition depicting the change of Finnish society and culture from the
Middle Ages to Finland's independence is being renewed and will open in
2021.
Changing exhibitions
The National Museum has two larger
changing exhibitions and smaller short-term pop-up exhibitions every
year.