A gateway to the 'backwoods': Aalto and the matter of rooting modernity

摘要

Mediating between forestand garden, tradition and modernity, a small wooden gate at Alvar Aalto's Villa Mairea is shown to be deeply rooted in Finnish cultural memories. In 1939 Alvar Aalto completed a substantial house in a forest clearing for his friends Harri and Maire Gullichsen, wealthy heirs to the Ahlstrom company. Villa Mairea is loadedwith layer upon layer of meaning and multiple references to many architectures, past and present. If a unity, as many critics suggest, it is undoubtedly a difficult one. Indeed, Modernist herald, Sigfried Giedion, wrote of Villa Mairea that, 'even one accustomed to judge immediately the qualities of a building will not easily comprehend the architectural instrumentation of Mairea' [1].