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AALTO, Alvar (ð. 14) Born in Kuortane, Finland in 1898. Died in Helsinki in 1976. He studied architecture at the Helsinki University of Technology from 1916 to 1921. He returned to Jyväskylä where he opened his first architectural office in 1923. The following year he married architect Aino Marsio. Their honeymoon journey to Italy sealed an intellectual bond with the culture of the Mediterranean region that was to remain important to Aalto for the rest of his life. His furniture is manufactured by Artek, a company Aalto co-founded. His glassware designs (Aino Aalto as well as Alvar) are manufactured by Littala. Chairman of the Association of Finnish Architects SAFA (Honorary Member since 1958) - 1943-1958. Professor of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology M.I.T. (Cambridge, USA) - 19461948. Member of the Finnish Academy (Emeritus Member since 1968) – 1955. President of the Finnish Academy - 1963-1968. He was a Scandinavian architect and designer, noted for his humanistic approach to modernism. His work includes architecture, furniture and glassware. He was one of the first and most influential architects of the Scandinavian modern movement, and member of the Congres Internationaux d’Architecture Moderne. Among his most significant works are the Finlandia Hall in Helsinki and the campus of Helsinki University of Technology. Aalto’s glassware includes the world-famous Savoy Vase (”The Eskimo Woman’s Leather Breech”), 1936 - an icon of 20th century design. Entirely plain but for the free organic curves to provide decorative interest, this vase introduced a new abstract vocabulary into glass design, a development that art critics have attributed both to the designer’s fondness for natural forms and to the influence of such surrealist artists as Jean Arp. Sometimes known as the Savoy vase from its use in the Savoy restaurant in Helsinki which Aalto built in 1937,
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this piece and others in the series took First Prize in a competition sponsored by the Finnish manufacturer Karhula-Iittala in 1936. The competition aimed to find new tableware and art-glass designs for the International Exhibition in Paris in 1937 where these pieces were first exhibited. They ranged from a shallow, 3-inch dish to a tall vase about 39 inches high. This model was originally produced in clear, brown, azure blue, green, and smoke-coloured glass. The gorgeous shape of the vase is exhibited worldwide in galleries and museum collections, such as The Museum of Modern Art in New York. ACKERMAN, Peter (ð. 30) Born in Jena, Germany in 1934. Between 1954 and 1956 he attended the Free University in Berlin. He continued his study at the Higher School of Fine Arts n Berlin (1956-1962). In 1966 he received the German art critics award and in 1971 – the Villa Romana award for art. He works mainly in the area of etching. ANNA, Margit (ð. 16) Born in Hungary in 1913. Died in 1991. She attended Vaszary’s school (1932-1936). Her first exhibition was at the Ernst Museum in 1936 together with her husband Imre Amos. In 1937 the couple left for Paris where they met Mark Chagall. In the artist’s earlier works the lyrical rhythm is in harmony with the elements of grotesque. Between 1945 1948 she took part in a number of individual and group exhibitions as part of the European school. One of the main motifs in many of her paintings from that period is the puppet symbolizing man, subordinated to the tempests of history. Over the next period she acquired a much more austere style. From the mid 1960s every now and then there are scenes in her paintings filled with subdued tragedy (”A Walk by Horse”, 1967) or with childish innocence (”Fairytale” 1964). The image of the puppet was linked closely to black humour whereas the metamorphoses were drawn from surrealistic and expressionistic ideas.