Moomin Exhibition

Courage, Freedom, Love! The Moomins 75

14.8.2020 - 28.2.2021

"a magical journey into the values and philosophy of the Moomins"

(picture post)

This exhibition had escaped my notice, until my mom brought it to my attention. So, once I learned about it of course I wanted to go! The exhibit is in the National Museum of Finland in Helsinki. 

Both in Finnish and Swedish the title for the exhibition is Courage, Love, Freedom, but in English the last two are switched. I wonder why they changed the word order for the English name? I don't think either one rolls off the tongue any easier than the other.

We went to the museum on the 27th of August. The entrance ticket cost 14€.

The exhibit was divided into five rooms and they were limiting  the amount of people that was allowed inside (the Moomin exhibition, not the whole museum). While we were waiting for our turn, we could hear on the radio of the guy who was guarding the entrance something like "two exited" and then he would let two people enter. I assume this was due to COVID-19, but then again, the way this exhibit was built, global virus or not, having the rooms filled with people would certainly have ruined the experience. (Like it did the Barbie exhibition)

All of the rooms were decorated with different themes, with a bunch of quotes printed on the walls and  cut out characters placed here and there and a few video projections. Aside from that, the were only a few things set on display in these "character boxes" that were inserted into the walls.

Visually, this exhibition is really fun and nice looking, but I thought it was also really shallow. Honestly, it looked like a really expensive Moomin themed children's playground you'd find inside a big shopping center. Alone, I don't think it is worth the price.

Sure, for the 14 € you paid for the entrance, you are free to see the other permanent exhibitions at the museum, but I've been to this museum so many times in my life, I didn't feel like checking it out once again. You would think they could knock a couple euros off the price if you only wanted to see the Moomin exhibition.

Before we left, I took a quick look inside the museum shop.  They had the standard stuff,  posters, postcards and notebooks with the "big wave" image they use for all advertising of this exhibition. The notebook would have been nice, especially because it had blank pages, but I already have too many notebooks, so I didn't get it or anything else Moomin. I only bought two rainbow colored pencils, 2€ each, the cheapest item I could find in the shop!

It was a beautiful day. Here's a picture of the Parliament House we walked past  on our way to the museum. Just because.

Holiday greetings

I don't consider myself as a collector of postcards, but here are a selected few I've held on to, that I'm going to share with you in honor of the season's spirit.

This Moomin card describes quite well how you feel after all the stress that leads up to our precious Holiday.

 Two beautifully detailed cards by Tove Jansson.

Lastly, a very atmospheric holiday card from year 1943 or 1948, the stamp on the back is so faded, I can't make out which year it is.

Merry Christmas!

Frame this

I had some pictures that needed framing, so I took some measurements and headed off to a flea market in hopes of finding fitting frames for cheap. I came home with three frames that suited my needs as I was planning all along to repaint them, for them to better match their intended pictures.

I had this paper bag with the motifs that appear in Tove's Jubilee mug illustration.
I cut the images out and carefully removed the handles on the back side of each image and framed them individually.

Taking a peek on the backside of the wooden frame reveals it to be originally from Ikea. This frame was the exact size I needed, I barely had to cut the image to make it fit. I was trying to match the color of the frame to the flowers on the right side, lower corner and I think it turned out pretty good.

With this, my reference for the frame's color were those blue flowers in the picture. In reality, those flowers are more like a grayish light blue in color and the frame is plain light blue, even though I really tried to get some gray in there. The reason for those white flowers along the sides.... I accidentally scraped off a tiny area of paint so that the original white color showed underneath. I didn't have any of the blue left and I didn't want to go through the pain of mixing it again, so instead I covered it up with those flowers.

The (plastic) frame looked nice as it was in silver, but a golden frame just looked better for this Ian McCaig's concept art of Queen Amidala, that I've printed out.

..... and with the leftover paint from mixing the colors for the frames I painted this (and right after, I really could have used all that blue color.....).

Flea market findings 3

Mushroom minions?

Finnish edition of Lewis Carroll's book Alice's Adventures in Wonderland illustrated by Tove Jansson. I have a faint memory that I may have seen parts of the Disney movie a long time ago, and already as a kid did it feel too trippy to the point that I was getting nauseous. I've stayed clear from anything Alice related since then.... until now. I'm halfway through the book and thus far, the Cheshire cat is the only thing I like about this book, besides the illustrations of course. Yeah, I don't care for the story really, I just wanted it for Tove's illustrations! <3

My first initial reaction to this was that this has to be a bootleg, but no, it still has a tag on its butt that reads Doraemon with copyright markings and a 7 - Eleven logo. After a little bit of google searching, I found this image with what looks to be a similar plush along with other characters from the series. Picture from: http://www.flickriver.com/photos/arjin/3871393216/

I wish this one could talk. I wanna know what it has been sitting on top of, because clearly it has been broken off something..... Something you can wear around your neck. First thing that comes to my mind would be one of those plastic,waterproof coin holders (or whatever these things are called) for some reason. Anyway, Gomamon was in a pretty rough shape at first glance, but after I removed the excess stuff and gave it a wash, it doesn't look too bad at all. ^_^

On Toad's butt it says Made for McDonald's 2013. I wonder why I bought these? 8D I don't even like Mario games that much....

 

These two Shaman King mini figures (originally surprise gifts from chocolate Easter eggs) and these 90's pacifier necklaces were in a box among other things, left out in the rain and it looked like it was about to be thrown in the trash. So, I "saved" them, the pacifiers for the nostalgia's sake and the shamankings just because of my "hey, that's anime! you can't throw that away!" -mentality (even if they aren't that pretty to look at).

Just because I want to repurpose/repaint it into something else. Don't know exactly what yet...

Total cost of all items: 3,00 €