Walter Runeberg

Walter Runeberg studied at University of Helsinki and Imperial Academy of Arts. Training under Carl Sjöstrand and Herman Wilhelm Bissen is recorded. Hilda Flodin and Robert Stigell are recorded as having studied under Walter Runeberg. The recorded working language is Finnish and Swedish. Subjects and genres recorded for the work are portrait statue and monumental. Places of work recorded in the authority are Helsinki, Rome and Paris. Work by Walter Runeberg is recorded in the collections of Finnish National Gallery, Nationalmuseum, HAM Helsinki Art Museum, Cygnaeus Gallery and Hämeenlinna Art Museum. Distinctions recorded are Ducat Prize, Cross of Liberty, 1st Class and Officier de l'Instruction publique.

Runeberg was born in Porvoo as the eldest son of J. L. Runeberg and his wife, Fredrika Tengström. He studied at the Academy of Fine Arts, Helsinki, and with sculptor Carl Eneas Sjöstrand. From 1858 through 1869 he studied at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts in Copenhagen under Herman Wilhelm Bissen, acquiring a clear influence from the neoclassical style of Bissen's master Bertel Thorvaldsen. He married Lina Elfving (1841–1916) in 1867. They had six children. After periods living and working in Rome (1862–1876) and Paris (1876–1893), Runeberg produced many of Helsinki's best-known examples of monumental public art. The largest is the Alexander II Monument in Senate Square, a commission awarded jointly to Runeberg and sculptor Johannes Takanen, then completed by Runeberg after Takanen's death in 1885. The pedestal features several allegorical figures. Notably, the figure representing Law is a version of the Suomi-neito, the Finnish maiden, here cloaked in bearskin. Runeberg was also frequently commissioned for private assignments. These include the bust of Ellan de la Chapelle in Paris in 1880, who became the wife of artist Albert Edelfelt in 1888. From 1893 to 1896, Runeberg worked in Copenhagen, Denmark. He is buried in the Hietaniemi Cemetery in Helsinki.