Porvoo Museum’s summer season opens with three shows exhibiting paintings by Albert Edelfelt, silhouette art, and contemporary art as part of the Porvoo Triennale. The fall season sees an online exhibition of shop signs from different eras. The Christmas season invites visitors to the traditional Christmas dinner table, while the exhibition about small birds continues past Christmas and through the winter.
The Porvoo Museum exhibition program for the year 2024 is now released. The museum celebrates Albert Edelfelt’s 170th anniversary together with the Albert Edelfelt Atelier Museum, and partners up with Porvoo Triennale as a venue for contemporary art. This year small is also beautiful in Porvoo Museum: The Old Town Hall will host an exhibition about miniature-size silhouettes, and at the end of the year Holm House invites visitors to spend a blue hour with small birds that overwinter in Finland. There is also an intense focus on the future during the year, as the process of renewing the permanent exhibitions in the Old Town Hall begins. The first part will open in 2025 in the ground floor gallery, which will become a hybrid exhibition/workshop space.
Albert Edelfelt 170
9.6.2024–3.5.2026
In 2024 it will be 170 years since the birth of the artist Albert Edelfelt, and Porvoo Museum will mark the occasion with a new exhibition in the main hall of the Old Town Hall. The exhibition includes the well-known and beloved oil paintings from the museum’s collection, as well as other material related to Albert Edelfelt’s life in Porvoo.
Silhouette. The Long Outline
9.6.2024–3.5.2026
An exhibition about silhouette art opens in the smaller hall in the Old Town Hall. Before photography became common, silhouettes or shadow pictures were a cheap and easy way of making images, especially profile portraits. Landscape silhouettes cut by Anders Wilhelm Boije, who lived in Drägsby Manor in the 19th century, take center stage in the exhibition.
Porvoo Triennale 2024: Space is a Common Thing
9.6.–1.9.2024
Porvoo Triennale 2024: Space Is a Common Thing exhibits art all over the city, including Porvoo Museum’s Holm House. The galleries on the first floor will house works by Mette Björneberg and Jenni Tuominen, and in the granary behind the building the audience can take part in Drawing Theater, a performative installation by the artists Petri Hytönen, Pan Jianfeng and Kalle Turakka Purhonen.
The Blue Hour. An Exhibition about the Birds of Winter
27.11.2024–2.3.2025
Small birds that overwinter in Finland have decorated the branches of fir trees for thousands of years before the formation of the Christmas tree tradition. This winter in Holm House visitors can enjoy a tree decorated with small birds in an exhibition about the wintering of birds. The model birds made of metal and mass are by the curator of the natural history collections, Solveig Bergholm.
Christmas in Porvoo Museum
27.11.2024–12.1.2025
Service Here. Shop Signs from Porvoo Museum’s Collection [Online]
31.10.2024
The online exhibition lets users explore shop signs from Porvoo Museum’s collections. Museum collections are evidence of times that are past and places that have changed, and the exhibition built on the StoryMaps platform will show the signs’ connections to different times and places with the help of timelines, maps, and old photographs.
Valiant, Trusty, and Hardworking – The Horse in Eastern Uusimaa [Touring Exhibition]
1.2.2024
The second part in the touring exhibition series gathers together memories, knowledge, and photographs of the horse in the Eastern Uusimaa region. The light and easy to set up exhibition is part of Porvoo Museum’s regional museum work and different organizations can borrow the material from the museum to set up their own exhibition. Available from the beginning of February. The first part of the series on the theme of cows is also available. Information: Mai Joutselainen, mai.joutselainen@porvoonmuseo.fi 040 73 44 042
Exhibitions from last year continue at the start of the year
– Last summer’s super popular exhibition Phenomenal Iris about the production of the AB Iris factory continues until the end of March, which means that the exhibition can still be visited until Easter Saturday.
– The Nation’s Runeberg exhibition in J. L. Runeberg’s Home Museum is also still open during 2024.
– Porvoo Virtual Art Gallery opened in December with the exhibition Porvoo and Artists, which shows visual arts from the 1950s to today from collections owned by Porvoo Museum and the City of Porvoo. Try visiting the virtual gallery at the same time with a friend!
Permanent exhibitions: art history, cultural history, natural history
The permanent exhibitions in Holm House and the Old Town Hall present the river valley of Porvoo, its formation and its inhabitants from the ice age onwards, life in the 18th century, works by artists and designers from Porvoo, and objects from the 19th century.
Shared ticket to both museums 12 € (discount ticket 8 €, under 18 years free of charge).