Carl Wilhelm Vallgren

Place: Porvoo

Born: 1855

Death: 1940

Biography:

Ville Vallgren was a Finnish sculptor born in 1855 in the city of Porvoo, the son of the city doctor Georg Wallgren. He studied architecture at the Helsinki Polytechnic and later moved to Paris in 1878, where he studied under Pierre Jules Cavalier at the École des Beaux-Arts. In 1882, he married Swedish sculptor Antoinette Råström, with whom he worked together. She died in 1911. The same year he married French opera singer and painter Madeleine Imbert-Rohan, but the marriage was rocky from the start and ended only two years later. In 1913, he moved back to Finland, where he met and married his third wife, Finnish sculptor Viivi Paarmio. He died on 13 October 1940 in Helsinki, and he was buried in Porvoo. Vallgren's best-known work is the statue Havis Amanda in Helsinki. His mirrors, figurines, lamp stands, urns, and candelabra established his reputation as a decorative artist. Of his statues and portraits, several are in New York City in the Vanderbilt collection, notably Death and Resurrection and A Breton Girl. His works in Finland include a Mariatta, in the Imperial Castle, and a Christ in the National Museum at Helsinki. The marble group Maternity is in the Museum of Arras, and a bronze statuette, Youth, in the Berlin National Gallery.