Jussi Mantynen (1886-1978)

LYNX ROSVORITARI

Bronze, with even brown patina,

Signed and dated 1930, mounted on oak base.

Provenance: Cuthbert Dixon 1937. Cuthbert was one of the three grandsons of Peter Dixon who founded and owned Peter Dixon Paper Company one of the largest newsprint paper manufacturers in the UK. They had paper mills in Yorkshire, a steamship company along with their own paper mill opened in Finland in 1926.

Jussi Mantynen is Finlands' most highly regarded 20th century animal sculptor, his sculptures of wild animals and birds are in many museums and collections. Public works are in Scandinavia and the USA.

Mantynen studied at Ateneum art school and learned sculpture from Alpo Sailo and painting from Akseli Gallen-Kallela. He later enrolled at the academy of art in Florence. Mantynen studied animals as both an artist and scientist. He worked as a taxidermist's assistant and as a taxidermist at Helsinki University Zoological Museum. In addition to his own work as a taxidermist, Mantynen studied animals by observing them in zoological collections and art museums. It was in art museums that Mantynen became particularly intrested in the Assyrian and Egyptian representations of animals.

Although he was well known in the science community due to his work, he also had success as an artist. The National Museum in Stockholm purchased a group of his granite bears, the Cranbrook Academy in Michigan obtained two monumental lynx sculptures made from diorite, Brussels and Paris awarded him the Grand Prix, and his first one man show was held in Stockholm in 1934 with another one man show in London in 1939. Mantynen decided to devote his full time to sculpture following the success of his London exhibit. Mantynen was an artist who went from a natural to a more abstract representation of animals. His favorite subject matters were the elk, bear, lynx, fox, swan and crane in all their moods and physical expressions.

Works in the following collections. The Ateneum Art Museum, Helsinki; Art museums in Lahti, Helsinki, Hämeenlinna, Tampere, Tornio, Turku; Gösta Serlachius Art Museum, Mänttä; Moderna Museet, Stockholm, Eskilstuna museum. Public works: "Moose," Viborg (1928, cast in bronze at the Natural History Museum in Helsinki, 1972); "Bear in the anthill" Bear Park next Kallio Church, Helsinki (1931); "Lynx", the entrance to the Gösta Serlachius Art Museum, Mänttä (1935); "Swans", the Old Library Park, Tampere (1937);"Parent Pride", the Cranbrook Academy of Art Museum, Michigan, United States (1938); "Cranes at the well," Esplanade Park, Lovisa (1950);"Swans", Puolalanpuisto park, Turku (1959); "Tails", Lahti (1961); "Cranes at the nest", the park at St Erik's Hospital, Stockholm (1958).