Julian Anderson - Tuomas Tenkanen: In lieblicher Bläue (2025-26)

IN LIEBLICHER BLÄUE - ASPECTS OF A COLOR IN 100 YEARS OF ART A film by Tuomas Tenkanen of an art and music installation in the Wanantaka Art Gallery in Finland (July 2025 - January 2026). The art was selected from the Wanantaka art collection by Julian Anderson at the invitation of the gallery’s Directors Carl Gustaf Ehrnrooth and his wife Maire Gullichsen Ehrnrooth. ‘It’s one of the most exciting things I’ve ever done,’ Anderson says, ‘I’ve been an art lover for many years but never remotely imagined that one day I’d be able to curate my own exhibition!’ Visual art lies behind a lot of Anderson’s music, notably his poem for violin and orchestra IN LIEBLICHER BLÄUE (2015), which was inspired by the prose poem ‘In Lovely Blueness’ attributed to the 19th century German poet Friedrich Hölderlin. ‘I’ve also written an ensemble work called VAN GOGH BLUE (2016) and my BOOK OF HOURS for ensemble and electronics (2003-5) was very much prompted in its harmonies and textures by the many beautiful shades of blue in Medieval art and stained glass. That said, I’m not synaesthetic like Messiaen or Scriabin. I just sense a repeated affinity between the textures, harmonies, sound colours of music and visual textures, tints and brushstrokes. But this is purely intuitive.’ The art in this exhibition spans over a century, ranging from the watercolors of the classic Finnish painter (and friend of Sibelius) Akseli Gallen-Kallela to the glass installations of Mariele Neudecker. Photography is also included, as is a book - the first edition of James Joyce’s Ulysses (1912-22) which, at the author’s request, was clothed in a particular shade of blue to evoke both the Mediterranean and the Greek national flag. ‘I’m particularly happy to feature some key paintings by the late Olli Lyytikäinen,’ Anderson says, ‘as he seems to me with Per Kirkeby the greatest recent watercolorist. Kirkeby himself is represented by two typically bold large canvases.’ Prominent as blue is in any of the objects, it is far from the sole colour on display. ‘The show was really about blue in relation to other colors,’ Anderson comments, ‘to contextualise it and play with its many socio-cultural associations.’ To give the whole exhibition a sonic environment, Anderson devised a susbtantial electro-acoustic soundtrack lasting just over 36 minutes, entitled The Colour of Time (2024-25), which was played throughout the show’s run and is heard in this film. The composer did not restrict his music to a purely illustrative approach: ‘It doesn’t depict any one painting specifically, but the four Atmospheric Compasses by Olafur Eliasson, which were placed near the corners around the lower floor so as to give a sort of frame to the rest of the show, perhaps inspired the substantial, dense passages of slowly evolving and drifting overtones which return from time to time as a sort of changing refrain across the music.’ Readings from the Finnish national epic the Kalevala were another sound source but, as Anderson says, ‘you don’t have to understand ancient Finnish to listen to the music! The sheer sound of that beautiful language is as important as its meaning, perhaps even more so.’ Sounds of Finnish nature - wind, rain, the calls and crises of various Nordic birds - are another source for the soundscape, as were the ringing of various sizes of bell which punctuate the music several times. As an installation IN LIEBLICHER BLÄUE was devised around the shape of the Wanantaka Art Gallery but it may in future be mounted elsewhere, with some variations depending upon location. ‘Blue is so rich in associations and so intensely evocative that a great deal of visual art depends upon it,’ Anderson comments, ‘so it would certainly be possible to mount more than one version of this show. I am deeply indebted to Carl Gustaf and Maire for encouraging and stimulating me in my first venture into art curation. I’d never have managed without them.’ IN LIEBLICHER BLÄUE opened in early July 2025 at the start of the Finnish edition of the international musical course Creative Dialogue founded in 2007 by Anssi Karttunen, Kaija Saariaho and Magnus Lindberg, with which Anderson has been involved since four years. Creative Dialogue Finland takes place annually on the Wanantaka Estate. ‘It’s one of the very finest courses of its kind I’ve ever experienced,’ Anderson says, ‘the kind of course where anything can happen, where musicians discover new potential in themselves and in each other. Anssi Karttunen is the fantastic stimulator and enabler on Creative Dialogue – in fact it was he who put me together with Carl Gustaf and Maire, so none of this would have happened without Anssi. This installation was both a surprise to me and yet also a natural outcome of the incredible openness of spirit and sharing that Creative Dialogue so brilliantly encourages.’ Music: Julian Anderson 'The Color of Time' © Schott Music Ltd. 2025 Film: Tuomas Tenkanen, © Tuomas Tenkanen 2026