Aulis Blomstedt
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Yrjö Aulis Uramo Blomstedt (28 February 1906 – 21 December 1979) was a Finnish architect and professor of architecture at the
Helsinki University of Technology Helsinki University of Technology (TKK; fi, Teknillinen korkeakoulu; sv, Tekniska högskolan) was a technical university in Finland. It was located in Otaniemi, Espoo in the metropolitan area of Greater Helsinki. The university was founded in ...
. He was a renowned modernist architect and architectural theoretician in the decades following the Second World War. Blomstedt was born into an architect family: his father Yrjö Blomstedt was an architect known for his National Romantic Jugend architecture, while his older brother Pauli E. Blomstedt was, until his premature death at the age of 35, a pioneering early modernist architect. His other brother, Jussi Jalas (formerly Armas Jussi Veikko Blomstedt), was a composer. Blomstedt was married to Heidi Blomstedt, the daughter of the composer
Jean Sibelius Jean Sibelius ( ; ; born Johan Julius Christian Sibelius; 8 December 186520 September 1957) was a Finnish composer of the late Romantic and 20th-century classical music, early-modern periods. He is widely regarded as his country's greatest com ...
. They had two children, the artist Juhana Blomstedt and the architect Severi Blomstedt.


Life and career

Blomstedt spent his childhood in the city of
Jyväskylä Jyväskylä () is a city and municipality in Finland in the western part of the Finnish Lakeland. It is located about 150 km north-east from Tampere, the third largest city in Finland; and about 270 km north from Helsinki, the capital of ...
, and attended the same school as the renowned architect
Alvar Aalto Hugo Alvar Henrik Aalto (; 3 February 1898 – 11 May 1976) was a Finnish architect and designer. His work includes architecture, furniture, textiles and glassware, as well as sculptures and paintings. He never regarded himself as an artist, see ...
. From 1924 to 1930 Blomstedt studied architecture at
Helsinki University of Technology Helsinki University of Technology (TKK; fi, Teknillinen korkeakoulu; sv, Tekniska högskolan) was a technical university in Finland. It was located in Otaniemi, Espoo in the metropolitan area of Greater Helsinki. The university was founded in ...
. After qualifying he worked in various architect's offices before establishing his own office in 1945. He was appointed Professor of Architecture at Helsinki University of Technology in 1958, a position he held until 1972. In 1972 he was briefly a visiting professor at Washington University in St. Louis, USA. Blomstedt's position in Finnish architecture history is seen as the chief proponent of a highly rational modernist architecture, in sharp distinction to the more organic architecture of the chief figure in Finnish architecture, Alvar Aalto. To that end, Blomstedt was intrigued by architecture theory and building standardization, for which he proposed a number of highly elaborate proportional systems based on musical harmonics, the best known of which was the so-called Canon 60. One of his drawing analyses on harmonic proportions from 1973 was adopted as the logo of the
Museum of Finnish Architecture The Museum of Finnish Architecture ( fi, Suomen arkkitehtuurimuseo, sv, Finlands arkitekturmuseum) is an architectural museum in Helsinki, Finland. Established in 1956, it is the second oldest museum of its kind (after the Shchusev Museum of Arc ...
. Many of Blomstedt's theoretical writings were published in the journal Carré Bleu, a journal he jointly founded in Helsinki in 1958, together with Finnish architects Keijo Petäjä and Reima Pietilä, Finnish architecture historian Kyösti Ålander, and French architect André Schimmerling, whom together formed the CIAM Helsinki group, the Finnish group associated with CIAM (
Congrès Internationaux d'Architecture Moderne The ''Congrès internationaux d'architecture moderne'' (CIAM), or International Congresses of Modern Architecture, was an organization founded in 1928 and disbanded in 1959, responsible for a series of events and congresses arranged across Europ ...
).


Key works by Aulis Blomstedt

* Finnish Language Workers' Institute Annex, Helsinki (1954–59) * Ketju and Kolmirinne residential buildings,
Tapiola Tapiola (; sv, ) is a district of the municipality of Espoo on the south coast of Finland, and is one of the major urban centres of Espoo. It is located in the western part of Greater Helsinki. The name ''Tapiola'' is derived from '' Tapio'', w ...
, Espoo (1954) * Finnish Artists' Association studio terraced housing, Tapiola, Espoo (1955) * Karhunpojat apartment blocks, Tapiola, Espoo (1957) * Riistapolku apartment blocks, Tapiola, Espoo (1961)


References

* Pallasmaa, Juhani: “Man, Measure and Proportion: Aulis Blomstedt and the tradition of Pythagorean harmonics,” in Nikula, Riitta et al. (eds.), ''Acanthus 1992: The Art of Standards''. Helsinki: Museum of FinnishArchitecture, 1992. * Sarjakoski, Helena: ''Rationalismi ja runollisuus: Aulis Blomstedt ja Suhteiden taide'' ontains extensive English summary: "Rationalism and the Poetic" Helsinki: Rakennustieto, 2002. 1906 births 1975 deaths People from Jyväskylä 20th-century Finnish architects Modernist architects Finnish architecture writers {{Finland-architect-stub