Touko Valio Laaksonen, known by the pseudonym Tom of Finland, was a Finnish artist who made stylized highly masculinized homoerotic art, and influenced late 20th-century gay culture. He has been called the "most influential creator of gay pornographic images" by cultural historian Joseph W. Slade. Over the course of four decades, he produced some 3,500 illustrations, mostly featuring men with exaggerated primary and secondary sex traits, wearing tight or partially removed clothing.
Laaksonen c. 1959
In gay magazines, Laaksonen's drawings were often cropped to be less explicit, as in this 1968 edition of Physique Pictorial. The caption notes that reproductions of the complete "natural (nude) Tom drawings" are for sale by mail order.
Tom of Finland's room at the Tom of Finland Foundation's house in Los Angeles, 2002; photographed by Henning von Berg.
A Tom of Finland drawing on the cover of a 1963 issue of Physique Pictorial.
Kaarina is a town in Finland, located in the region of Southwest Finland. It lies south of the regional capital, Turku. The population of Kaarina is approximately 36,000, while the sub-region has a population of approximately 347,000. It is the 32nd most populous municipality in Finland, and the second largest municipality in the Southwest Finland region after Turku.
Kaarina
Lake Littoistenjärvi
Dance pavilion in Littoinen
Ravattula
