Editing Tove Jansson (section)

=== Painter and illustrator ===

==== Paintings ====

Although she became known first and foremost as an author, Tove Jansson considered her careers as author and painter to be of equal importance. She painted throughout her life.<!-- changing style from the classical [[impressionism]] of her youth to the highly abstract modernist style of her later years--> She exhibited during the 1930s and early 1940s, holding her first solo exhibition in 1943. Despite generally positive reviews, criticism induced Jansson to refine her style; her 1955 solo exhibition was simpler in detail and content. Between 1960 and 1970 she held five more solo exhibitions.<ref name="biografiakeskus"/> The National Biography of Finland describes Jansson as going "against the conventional image of an artist with her unusually even balance between visual art and writing."<ref name="biografiakeskus"/>

==== Murals ====

Throughout her career, Jansson created a series of commissioned [[mural]]s and public works which may still be viewed in their original locations, including:

* The canteen at the {{lang|sv|[[Stromberg (company)|Strömberg]]|italic=no}} factory at {{lang|fi|[[Pitäjänmäki]]|italic=no}}, Helsinki (1945)<ref name="biografiakeskus"/>
* The Aurora Children's Hospital in Helsinki<ref name="Liukkonen"/>
* The {{lang|fi|Seurahuone|italic=no}} hotel at [[Hamina]]<ref name="biografiakeskus"/>
* The ''[[Parable of the Ten Virgins|Wise and Foolish Virgins]]'' altarpiece in [[Teuva]] Church (1954)<ref name="biografiakeskus"/>
* [[Fairy tale|Fairy-tale]] murals in schools, including the [[kindergarten]] in [[Pori]] (1984)<ref name="biografiakeskus"/>

==== Illustrations ====

{{further|Illustrating Tolkien}}

[[File:Tove_Jansson_Smaug_destroys_Lake-town.jpg|thumb|upright|Detail of Jansson's drawing of [[Smaug]] destroying [[Lake-town]], a scene from a 1962 edition of ''[[The Hobbit]]''. Her work helped to define how [[fantasy]] could be illustrated,<ref name="Sundmark 2020"/> but has been seen as unfashionably "expressive".<ref name="Sundmark 2014"/><ref name="BL 2021"/> ]]

As well as illustrating her own books, Jansson illustrated Swedish translations of classics such as [[Lewis Carroll]]'s ''[[The Hunting of the Snark]]'' and ''[[Alice's Adventures in Wonderland]]''.<ref name="BL 2021"/>

She created a set of illustrations for the 1962 Swedish edition of [[J. R. R. Tolkien]]'s 1937 children's book ''[[The Hobbit]]''.<ref name="BL 2021">{{cite web |title=Tove Jansson's illustrations for Carroll and Tolkien |url=https://blogs.bl.uk/european/2021/11/tove-janssons-illustrations-for-carroll-and-tolkien.html |website=[[British Library]]: European Studies Blog |date=8 November 2021}}</ref> The scholar of literature Björn Sundmark states that Jansson's work helped to define how Tolkien's [[Middle-earth]] fantasy could be depicted visually.<ref name="Sundmark 2020">{{cite book |last=Sundmark |first=Björn |title=Translating and Transmediating Children's Literature |chapter=The Translation and Visualization of Tolkien's The Hobbit into Swedish, the Aesthetics of Fantasy, and Tove Jansson’s Illustrations |publisher=[[Springer International Publishing]] |publication-place=Cham |year=2020 |isbn=978-3-030-52526-2 |doi=10.1007/978-3-030-52527-9_7 |pages=117–132|s2cid=226550272 }}</ref> The edition with her illustrations was not reprinted for many years,{{efn|It was eventually reprinted in 1994 in the same 24 cm format by Rabén Prisma, {{isbn|978-9-15182-727-8}}.}} even though reviewers and "Tolkienists" liked Jansson's "expressive"<ref name="Sundmark 2014"/> images. Sundmark suggests that the reason was that in the 1960s, a new, more realistic style became the norm for fantasy art.<ref name="Sundmark 2014">{{cite journal |last=Sundmark |first=Björn |title="En hobbit och ett mumintroll skulle kunna mötas i bästa sämja": Receptionen av Bilbo, en hobbits äventyr (1962) |language=Swedish |trans-title="A hobbit and a moomintroll would be able to meet in complete harmony": Reception of 'Bilbo, en hobbits äventyr' |journal=Barnboken |publisher=The Swedish Institute for Children's Books |volume=37 |year=2014 |issn=0347-772X |doi=10.14811/clr.v37i0.186|doi-access=free |hdl=2043/20341 |hdl-access=free }}</ref>