TRAVELLERS IN LAPLAND

Eight Lappish cultural facilities: The Provincial Museum of Lapland, Rovaniemi Art Museum, Tornio River Valley Provincial Museum, Gold Museum, Regional Library of Lapland, Tornio Town Library, Pello Municipal Library and the Arctic Centre of the University of Lapland were awarded a grant for the Illustrated Northern Culture partnership project. These participating bodies have been involved in producing the Travellers in Lapland multimedia presentation by independently selecting and working on their own theme, material and scriptwriting.

The Rovaniemi Art Museum participated in the project with their theme being Alvar Aalto in Lapland which focuses on the architecture in Lapland designed by Alvar Aalto.

The theme used by the Regional Library of Lapland, Pello Municipal Library, Tornio Town Library and Tornio River Valley Provincial Museum is Giuseppe Acerbi's Travels in Lapland in 1799. Also included are the drawings of Acerbi’s travel companion A.F.Skjöldebrand taken from the journey.

The Arctic Centre’s On the trail of Castrén in the nenets land tells of the Nenets people and their way of life. The imagery was acquired from the trip to Siberia by Tuula Tuisku and Aune Kämäräinen.

The Degree Measurement Expedition of De Maupertuis tells of the French expedition to survey the shape of the Earth in the Tornio River Valley during the years 1736-1737. These pages have been made by the Regional Library of Lapland and the Pello Municipal Library.

Southerner Men's Life Sentence tells of the gold rush of the Lemmenjoki River in 1946 and of the men who were afflicted with gold fever for their whole lives. The tales are based on the recollections of Heikki Kokko.

The Regional Library of Lapland participated by collating Untiring Wanderers, which includes photographic material of four photographers, Marja Vuorelainen, Yrjö Metsälä, Mauno Mannelin and Jukka Suvilehto. The script tells of the history of tourism in Lapland with special focus on the wanderers of the 1950s through to the mass tourism of the 1990s.

The Old Maps of the Arctic Region shows the collection of old maps belonging to the Regional Library of Lapland. These pages display fifteen individually digitalised map documents in addition to the maps of a book published in 1928 of Olof Tresk depicting the Lapland of the Kemi and Tornio region during the period 1642-1643. These old maps illustrate Lapland, the North Calotte and Scandinavia. The pages have been produced as part of the Digmore, Digital Cultural Heritage Project in co-operation with the Regional Library of Lapland and the Faculty of Arts of the University of Lapland.