Tom of Finland House and Museum

In February of 1978, famed Finnish erotic illustrator Touko Laaksonen- more commonly known by his pseudonym, Tom of Finland- first traveled to Los Angeles and met Durk Dehner, a 28-year-old gay director, publisher, and art collector. The two had been corresponding by letter since 1976, after Dehner saw a clipping of an illustration by Laaksonen in a leather bar in New York City and was inspired by the artist's work. In Los Angeles, Dehner let Laaksonen stay at his residence while the illustrator's work was shown at solo exhibitions across the city. During this time, the two men became steadfast friends, partners, and creative collaborators.

Born in rural Finland on May 8, 1920, Touko Laaksonen first started drawing in his early adolescence. Privately, he began making homoerotic sketches of the hyper-masculine men who populated his area, such as lumberjacks and farmhands. After fighting in World War II, Laaksonen moved to Helinski where he resumed drawing homoerotic illustrations of a variety of masculine male archetypes. In 1956, Laaksonen submitted some of his work to Physique Pictorial, an early "beefcake magazine" published in the United States. To stay anonymous, he signed his work "Tom". The publisher placed the work on the magazine's cover, and added "of Finland" to the artist's now-iconic pseudonym and signature. The dozens of Physique Pictorial issues which would later continuously feature Tom of Finland's drawings became immensely popular among gay men during the following decades. Notable artists such as Andy Warhol and Robert Mapplethorpe were also fans of Tom of Finland. However, due to a lack of support for erotic artists during the time period, the work he made was often stolen and redistributed without consent. When Dehner first met Laaksonen in 1978, Dehner's experience within the art industry proved extremely helpful in controlling distribution and booking exhibitions for Laaksonen.

When Dehner purchased a two-story residential home on Laveta Terrace in 1979, he invited Laaksonen to stay with him there whenever he visited Los Angeles. Although the 59-year-old artist had to return to Finland every six months due to visa restrictions, 1421 Laveta Terrace became what he called his "home away from home" for the last decade of his life- one of his most artistically and personally productive periods. While working at what became known as "TOM house", Laaksonen rose to international acclaim within the art world, as institutions such as the Museum of Modern Art in New York and the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles began collecting and exhibiting his illustrations. In 1984, Laaksonen and Dehner founded the Tom of Finland Foundation- a non-profit dedicated to the preservation of Laaksonen's work and the protection of all erotic art.

In 1989, due to health problems, Touko Laaksonen moved back to Helsinki. Two years later, he died at his home there at the age of 71 after a stroke. Over the course of his career, he had produced 3,862 known pieces of artwork. Roughly 800 of these pieces are estimated to have been drawn at TOM house, which has since been renamed Tom of Finland House and Museum and is open to the public. Today, the house and the Tom of Finland Foundation- both headed by Durk Dehner- are still in operation. In 2016, Dehner nominated the Tom of Finland House and Museum for a Historic-Cultural Monument designation. The City Council of Los Angeles approved the nomination request in November of that year, protecting the house from any future development.

Cultural Heritage Commission. Historic-Cultural Monument Application for the TOM OF FINLAND HOUSE, Los Angeles Department of City Planning. September 15th 2016. Accessed November 28th 2020. https://planning.lacity.org/StaffRpt/CHC/2016/9-15-2016/6_TomofFinland_Final.pdf.

Foster, R. Daniel. An L.A. home where homoerotic artist Tom of Finland lived is a shrine to his legacy, LA Times. October 2nd 2019. Accessed October 12th 2020. https://www.latimes.com/lifestyle/story/2019-10-02/tom-of-finland-house-echo-park.

LA Conservancy. Tom of Finland House, LA Conservancy. Accessed November 28th 2020. https://www.laconservancy.org/locations/tom-finland-house.

The Lavender Effect. Durk Dehner, The Lavender Effect. May 11th 2015. Accessed November 28th 2020. http://www.thelavendereffect.org/projects/ohp/durk-dehner/.