Abstract
Abstract This article investigates the physical and mental landscapes of childhood after the Second World War in two regions, northern Sweden and northern Finland. The material analyzed consists of entries submitted to art and essay contests for schools in each country. The aim of the Finnish contest was to increase aid during reconstruction and to mentally unite the nation. The Swedish contest, organized by a local heritage association, sought to foster regionalism and strengthen people's feeling of belonging to a nation-state. The analysis draws on perspectives from visual culture studies, humanistic geography, and an individual's interpretation of place. The article illustrates the intertextual connections between the contest submissions and material such as school posters. The students' paintings and drawings both reconstruct and comment on what was an imposed cultural agenda. Their entries reflect the national mental landscape as well as the local school aesthetics, ethics, and norms that prevailed at the time.
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