In his forest interiors, as we have seen above, Holmberg focused on the depiction of trees, but besides that also on grey granite, which can be seen everywhere in Finland. Even in the centre of Helsinki grey stone projects here and there. It is no wonder that Topelius talked about the land of grey granite. In Pirkkala, just outside Tampere, Holmberg painted a watercolour study of a forest interior in which this grey stone covers most of the pic-ture’s surface.691 Later, he painted two pictures of the same scene, varying the trees growing on the rock: in one painting the trees are mostly pines and spruces, whereas in the other one they are birches. Reitala suggests that the inspiration for these forest scenes might be August Cappelen’s Forest Interior, from 1850.692 Holmberg’s interest in granite rock continues in one of his most popular paintings, A Motif from Toriseva (Aihe Torisevalta, 1859)693, in which he has represented a scene from the southern end of the Lower Toriseva Lake. Although we, as viewers, are stationed by the lake, very close to the water’s edge, we cannot see the entire lake, but only a very limited part of it. In front of us, a steep sunlit rock face, called Inkerinkallio, rises from the lake. The sunshine coming from the upper left corner, high-lights the lower part of the rock face closest to the lake’s surface. At this point, the rock radiates the light, creating a misty, almost dreamlike effect.
There is no sign of wind as the lake’s surface is calm, reflecting the rock face almost like a mirror. We cannot, however, see the rock completely, because our view is interrupted by a group of trees growing on the shore. There is a tall, slim birch on the left and two pine trees on its right – one gnarled and the other standing up straight. Behind the pines, we can detect the top of a spruce as well as some broad-leaved trees and bushes around them. In the foreground on the left, the artist has placed a greyish tree stump with twisting roots. When we move our gaze farther to the right, there is a vari-ety of undergrowth and a group of stones, in front of which we can discern the delicate form of a plant. The stones seem to be covered with green moss, or grey lichen; and as a hint of human activity, there is a rowing boat on the shore. Only the bow of the boat is visible – the rest hidden behind a hump on top of which the birch is growing. We can, however, see the piv-ots for the oars on both sides of the boat, and there is a ring hanging from the pivot closest to us, creating the only clear shadow cast in the painting.
Despite the steep rock face in the background, the landscape does not
691 Painted in Mattila on 6 Aug 1857, No.
A I 470:109, FNG.
692 See Reitala 1986, 89−90.
693 No. G-2011-56, Signe and Ane Gyllen-berg Foundation, Espoo.
65 w E r N E r H O l M b E r G A Motif from Toriseva, 1859 oil on canvas
61.5 x 56 cm
Signe and Ane Gyllenberg foundation, Espoo
Photo: Matias Uuskylä
195 fAc I N G f I N N I S H N AT U r E
appear impenetrable, because a deeper sight, or an entrance into the landscape, is provided behind the group of trees on the right. We can assume that there is a passage or a path around the rock here, as we can see some light looming between the trees in the distance.
Toriseva is a ravine with three separate narrow lakes: Lower (Alainen), Middle (Keskinen) and Upper (Yläinen) Toriseva Lake. It is lo-cated in Virrat694, a small town in the region of Pirkanmaa today.695 It is famous for its narrow lakes surrounded by steep rocks, and it became a popular tourist destination in the nineteenth century. The Finnish national poet J. L. Runeberg praised Toriseva in his Fänrik Ståls sägn
er (Tales of the Ensign Stål, published in two parts, 1848 and 1860) as a sight that was as impressive as Lake Saimaa or the rapids at Imatra, both popular tourist resorts at the time.696 Topelius mentions Toriseva in his Finland framställdt i teckningar, and talks about it first as not so ‘promi-nent, but a rare speciality of nature’. He describes the location of the lake between the steep, upright rock face on one side and low-lying land on the other, and points out that, despite its depth, the lake is actually very narrow.697 Six years later, however, he seems to have changed his mind, as he writes about Toriseva in his newspaper Helsingfors Tidningar, and praises the special quality of it as follows:
Although Toriseva is a lake, one has to admit that it does not re
semble other lakes. So dark is this water that even the clouds in the sky waste their glow on its even, mirrorlike surface; it is so quiet, heavy and dead that not a single breeze, which may find its way there over the high rock face, or from the midst of the for
est, breaks its calm dark surface. It is nice to wander there along the shore of this dark lake for an hour, if only the rock keeps de
scending and ascending every now and then; if only the forest thins out here and there, but becomes thick again; but the lake remains unchanged, the same all the time, as narrow and hidden and dark and dead; one believes one sees the Styx and looks for an entrance to Orcus on the upright cliff.698
According to Topelius, the task of a landscape artist was to frame his view to include just a few details, for instance, a close-up of a rock face with some pines, rather than to paint a wide panoramic view
694 Virdois in Swedish.
695 Virrat lies some 100 kilometres north-west of Tampere. The borders of differ-ent regions and the number of differdiffer-ent provinces in Finland have been changed several times since then, so the current regions (maakunta in Finnish, landskap in Swedish) and provinces (lääni in Finnish;
län in Swedish) are different from those in the nineteenth century. In the 1840s, Vir-rat belonged to the region of Satakunta, but to the province of Vaasa. Satakunta is nowadays one of the so-called histori-cal regions, and the borders of the Vaasa province (Vasa län in Swedish) are differ-ent. For this, see historical maps on http://
www.vanhakartta.fi/historialliset-kartat/
pitaejaenkartat/@@mapview?handle=
hdl_123456789_24059; Kartbilaga till Fin
land framställdt i teckningar, Zacharias Topelius Skrifter XII, Svenska litteratursäll-skapet i Finland.
696 More precisely, it is Runeberg’s poem “July 5” in the Fänrik Ståls sägner (Tales of the Ensign Stål). For this, see also Reitala 1986, 116, 118.
697 […] Bland sina hundrade sjöar har Wirdois en föga bemärkt, men sällsam naturegen
het, Toriseva sjö, som på ena sidan begrän
sad af en hög lodrät bergvägg, på den andra af lågländ mark, sträcker sig med ett litet afbrott omkring 3 verst i längd, med ett på sina ställen förvånade djup, under det att bredden aldrig öfverstiger 8 à 10 famnar […]. Topelius 2011 [1845], 136.
698 Även är Torisewa en sjö, så får man tillstå, att den föga liknar andra sjöar. Så swart är denna watten, att sjelfwa himlens skyar förgäves spilla sina rosor I dess glatta spegel;
så stilla, tungt och dödt, att ingen fläkt, förir
rad öfwer klippans höga mur och skogens stängsel, nånsin rör den mörka ytans lugn.
Att wandra sakta der en timmas wäg wid sidan utaf denna swarta sjö, har sitt behag;
blott klippan sänkes då och då och höjer sig igen; blott skogen glesnar här och der, men tätnar åter strax; men sjön är oföränderlig, densamma städse, lika small och gömd och mörk och död; man tror sig skåda Styx och letar i lodräta muren efter nedgången till Orkus. Helsingfors Tidningar on 1 Feb 1851;
see also on 22 Jan 1851, 8 Feb 1851 and 12 Feb 1851.
66 w E r N E r H O l M b E r G
Sketch from Toriseva, dated 30 July 1859 No. A I 472:6/25, pencil on paper finnish National Gallery / Ateneum Art Museum
Photo: Finnish National Gallery / Tero Suvilammi
67 w E r N E r H O l M b E r G
Sketch from Toriseva, dated 20 July 1859 No. A I 472:6/27, pencil on paper finnish National Gallery / Ateneum Art Museum
Photo: Finnish National Gallery / Tero Suvilammi
197 fAc I N G f I N N I S H N AT U r E
of a lake.699 Topelius admired Holmberg’s earlier works, such as Kyrö Rap
ids,700 but, as Holmberg’s art evolved into a more realistic style, Topelius found his art somewhat strange. Interestingly, this was also the case with the Motif from Toriseva.701 Allan Tiitta has interpreted that this change in Topelius’s attitude towards Holmberg’s new paintings was caused by their touch of realism, which did not coincide with Topelius’s ideal of the Finnish landscape.702 Later in his memorial speech in 1861, Topelius praised Holm-berg as the painter of the Finnish forest, grieving his early death by stating that he had been a young genius. In this he took Holmberg’s Motif from Toriseva as an example of his skills, and wrote how the artist was able to depict it objectively in a simple manner. For Topelius, however, Holmberg was a romantic, although he had spotted a new, dangerous manner in his latest artworks.703
Holmberg’s picture, A Motif from Toriseva, is based on the sketch-es and studisketch-es made on a painting trip to Finland in the summer of 1859.
He left Düsseldorf for Finland on 20 May, arriving in Turku at the beginning of June, and started his painting trip to Ruovesi and Virrat by crossing Lake Näsijärvi on 19 July. After the crossing, he continued on foot to Virrat, ar-riving the following day.704 Holmberg drew his first sketch by the Lower Toriseva Lake on his first day there.705 It is noteworthy that the finished picture follows the composition of this sketch to a great extent. It could even be compared to a Komposition produced by Schirmer and Lessing for their Landschaftliche Verein. It is easy to detect the slim birch on the right and the rowing boat behind it. The group of stones in the foreground and the group of trees behind can be seen, too, as well as the passage on the left. However, one dominating element is missing, since there is no sign of the gnarled pine tree which is seen in the middle of the finished picture.
Neither is the passage – as a passage where one can go through – visible;
instead, it can be perceived just as a deep hole in the rock face. In fact, Holmberg has squeezed the scene in a similar way to Frederic Church in his The Heart of the Andes to make place for all important elements in his artwork, because in real life the passage would be a little bit farther to the right. However, the place is topographically clearly recognisable, although the vegetation has naturally changed over time, but there are still slender pines growing on the shore of the lake.706
Holmberg drew his sketches with a pencil, but he also made studies in watercolour at Toriseva. The pencil sketches repeat the roughness
699 Tiitta 1994, 312.
700 Helsingfors Tidningar 12.4.1856; Reitala 1986, 148.
701 […] Mest främmande är Torisewa äwen för mången som warit på stället.
Orsaken är att bergväggens färg beror uppå solens ställning. Hr Holmberg har teckat den kl. 5 eller 6 på e.m., när dagern fallit från wester och då är allt fullkomligt natursannt[…]. […] Tori
sewa is strangest for those who have been there. The reason for this is the colour of the rock face which depends on the position of the sun. Mr Holmberg has drawn it at 5 or 6 pm. when the day
light has fallen from the west and eve
rything is naturally true […]. Helsing
fors Tidningar 10.5.1860; Reitala 1986, 149; Tiitta 1994, 310.
702 In addition to Holmberg’s Motif from Toriseva, Topelius writes here about his Farmhouse in Kuru (Talonpoikais-talo Kurussa, 1859, No. A I 94, FNG), and Post Road in Finland (see above).
He praises the former, but he criti-cises the latter. Helsingfors Tidningar 10.5.1860; Tiitta 1994, 310.
703 Topelius 1989 [1861], 37, 44−45.
704 Aspelin 1890, 154–155.
705 Sketch No. A I 472:6/25, dated 20 July 1859.
706 Photographs taken from Toriseva on 12 July 2018; Compare with Lukkari-nen 2008.
of the rock face more in detail, as for instance in the sketches dated 20 July and 21 July. The former represents the view as in the finished picture, where-as in the latter he hwhere-as composed a wider view of the lake along Inkerinkal-lio to the left.707 In comparison to the sketches, the studies composed in watercolour also hint at the different colour nuances of the rock face, trees or undergrowth, or they just stress the difference of light and shadow on the tree trunks.708 Since Holmberg composed his finished pictures based on the sketches and studies he made from nature, the studies in watercolour helped him to recall the colours of different elements. However, they do not convey any meticulous details as such, except for the study made for the greyish tree stump with twisting roots and a birch trunk.709
As for the composition of Holmberg’s finished picture and its authenticity, there are some interesting points made in the earlier research concerning the painting. Lukkarinen has pointed out that, for the gnarled pine in the middle of the picture, Holmberg used a sketch of a pine he had made on his previous painting trip to Finland in 1857. Thus, there is no sign of it in the sketches or studies made at Toriseva in 1859. Moreover, Lukkarinen claims that the pine does not fit in the picture as it looks rather short – actu-ally as if it has been cut in the middle – and therefore it is closer to the ones growing on a rock in the archipelago. According to him, this kind of borrow-ing and combinborrow-ing of motifs from different sketches affect the beholder’s looking experience, raising certain kind of expectations. When Aspelin was writing Holmberg’s biography in the 1890s this feature in Holmberg’s oeuvre in general was something that he found disturbing as well as restricting, because it did not follow his conceptions of realism or naturalism.710 Aspe-lin particularly criticised the combination of different motifs from different countries which, to his mind, gave the artwork an overall impression of Ideal-ism and, as a consequence, it did not represent any specific country.711
Keeping the above-mentioned in mind, I suggest, however, that Holmberg’s way of combining different elements from various sketches does not, as such, militate against the principles of naturalism in Düssel-dorf or its ‘true image of nature’. Nor does it deviate from the common pro-cedure of composing artworks using sketches and studies practised since Renaissance times. Holmberg’s representation of Toriseva thus expresses the core idea of the naturalism of the time as it keeps faithfully to the par-ticularities of the actual object – in this case the pine. Although the pine trunks are from another sketch from another place, it is not that far-fetched
707 Sketches Nos. AI 472:6/25 and A I 472:6/27, dated 21 July 1859, FNG.
708 Study No. A I 472:6/26, and sketch No.
A I 472:8/33, dated Virdois 21 July 59, FNG.
709 See No. A I 470:154, dated 15 Aug 59, FNG.
710 Sketch A I 470:105, dated 15 July 1857, FNG; Lukkarinen 2008, 28; compare also with Lukkarinen 2017 where he locates the pine growing on a rock by the lake Näsijärvi.
711 Aspelin writes here actually about another painting by Holmberg, Forest in Rainy Weather (Metsä sadeilmalla), 1859, which belongs to the imperial art collection of the Presidential Pal-ace in Helsinki. Aspelin 1890, 147–148;
See also Relas 2013, 241.