Welcome to the exhibition opening on Tuesday April 5th 5-7 PM!
Gallery Laterna Magica welcomes an exhibition of unforgettable visual travelogue in Europe during the last peaceful summer summer months before the Second World War, in 1939.
Architect Esko Suhonen (1908-1984) was an avid photographer throughout his lifetime. His photographic collection consists of thousands of negatives and slides starting from 1930.
In April 1939 Suhonen and his entourage embarked on a classic Grand Tour. Along for the trip was Suhonen's spouse, Alli Suhonen (neé Sohlman)who at the time worked as an intendent at the National Museum and later became Master of Arts and lecturer. Also travelling along were their friends Sakari and Airi Honkavaara. They were travelling with a car, a German Adler Trumpf Junior.
Their route was following along the classic Grand Tour route that had been popular among the European nobility especially in the 1800's. These companions in their thirties were from Helsinki and set sail from Turku to Stockholm on 22nd of April 1939. Their route by car went through Copenhagen, Hamburg and Münster to Holland, Brussels and Paris. In May they headed south to French and Italian Riviera and from there to Florence and Venice.
For tourists the world was still peaceful but signs of the changing times were already visible. In the Central Europe Suhonen sensed "changes in situation" as he wrote later in his letter. The return trip brought the compantions through the Brenner Pass and Austria to Munich, Berlin and Königsberg.
Suhonen was working as a building consultant at the time and told in an interview later on that one aim for the trip was to familiarize himself with the building industry in several European countries. Among his negatives were numerous shots of buildings but he also captured the life around him, people in the cities and in the countryside, sights an museums and travelling. In the harbours and by the bridges he was notified that photos were not allowed.
The last peaceful moments of this Grand Tour were spent by the sea in Pärnu Beach Hotel. It was three months before the war broke out.
The world in these photographs disappeared when the autumn came, and never returned. Suhonen wrote in a letter in December 1939: " I was working with a map of Europe today. I was looking at the route we took this spring. Our carefree trip around Europe. For many times have trought of how lucky we were to have made the trip."
After the war the trip and the photoraphs were forgotten.
When I look at the photographs from my grandparents Grand Tour I see hopefullness and future optimism. And those feelings will never disappear.
Ville Suhonen
Suhonen is a document film maker and a grandchild of Esko Suhonen.
Picture above Esko Suhonen: Alli, Nizza
