The Detour - digital library

The shared history of Finland, Russia and Estonia in 121 stages

Digital  library (2011)

What connects Turku and Tallinn, European Capitals of Culture in 2011? What connects the history of Finland with that of Estonia, two countries with similar languages just 70 km apart across the Baltic Sea? We took a detour via neighbouring Russia in search of the beginnings of an answer…
By documenting 121 locations from Turku to Tallin via St. Petersburg, The Detour explores the shared history and memory of Finland, Estonia and Russia. All 121 locations were chosen according to a single criterion: each one has a direct relationship with an episode in the history of at least two of these three countries. All of the photos, sound recordings and stories gathered along this itinerary, along with the interviews with the people we met, are available on a website offering various ways to explore the material: a mosaic providing an overview of all the locations, an exhaustive list, maps, a search module, or access to each location according to its position on the route in km.

Visitors to the website can discover the meaning of Cyrillic inscriptions on the gable of a Finnish farmhouse, or a metal triumphal arch at the heart of a birch forest, listen to a popular Soviet song resounding in a Karelian church, find out why thousands of vehicles wait in a Finnish car park before being exported to Russia, or explore the mysteries of an Estonian city that is invisible on Soviet-era maps…

The digital library “The Detour” was accompanied by a documentary film and a screening cycle in 20 cities around the Gulf of Finland.

What connects Turku and Tallinn, European Capitals of Culture in 2011? What connects the history of Finland with that of Estonia, two countries with similar languages just 70 km apart across the Baltic Sea? We took a detour via neighbouring Russia in search of the beginnings of an answer…

By documenting 121 locations from Turku to Tallin via St. Petersburg, The Detour explores the shared history and memory of Finland, Estonia and Russia. All 121 locations were chosen according to a single criterion: each one has a direct relationship with an episode in the history of at least two of these three countries. All of the photos, sound recordings and stories gathered along this itinerary, along with the interviews with the people we met,

are available on a website offering various ways to explore the material: a mosaic providing an overview of all the locations, an exhaustive list, maps, a search module, or access to each location according to its position on the route in km.Visitors to the website can discover the meaning of Cyrillic inscriptions on the gable of a Finnish farmhouse, or a metal triumphal arch at the heart of a birch forest, listen to a popular Soviet song resounding in a Karelian church, find out why thousands of vehicles wait in a Finnish car park before being exported to Russia, or explore the mysteries of an Estonian city that is invisible on Soviet-era maps…

The digital library “The Detour” was accompanied by a documentary film and a screening cycle in 20 cities around the Gulf of Finland.

On the same theme

THE DETOUR

Documentary film (2011)

in the same format

BORDER BISTRO

Webdoc (2013)

The Detour - digital library

Date: 2011 | Category: Digital library | Web developper: nicolas Kapfer | Partners / Funding bodies: Turku 2011, Tallinn 2011 European Capitals of Culture

On the same theme / In the same format

Documentary film (2011)

Webdoc (2013)