This book presents works by Finnish artists from the collections of the Ateneum Art Museum, illustrating the beginnings of our art scene, in the spirit of sophisticated Rococo and Romanticism. Artists went abroad for further studies, to Sweden, Italy, and Germany. Life in the grand duchy was mingled with a longing for distant lands, nature in the popular landscapes appears both wild and cultivated, and the past shows either solemn reflection or the joy of living.
