Sámi Museum and Nature Centre Siida’s new joint main exhibition Enâmeh láá mii párnááh – These lands are our children was opened June 1^st, 2022. Now in a little over a year, the exhibition has been seen by over 100 000 people!

We are very happy and touched by the positive reception of our new exhibition. The feedback we have received tells us our renewal has been successful.

Our new exhibition has been of interest to both local and travelers alike. A little less than half of the visitors have been Finnish. Most of our foreign visitors have been from Germany and France.

The overall number of visits to Siida is around 120 000 a year. This number includes also visits to Siida Shop, Metsähallitus’ customer service, Inari municipality tourist information, and restaurant Sarrit. In the previous record-breaking year, 2019, 64 000 people of the overall number of visitors visited the exhibitions. This year we are expecting the number of exhibition visitors to rise to well over 65 000, breaking the previous record.

Our Enâmeh láá mii párnááh – These lands are our children exhibition is close to one year old now. The past year has been busy, as our exhibition has been seen by 65 000 visitors. Before the busy summer season, it is time for maintenance work in the joint permanent exhibition of Sámi Museum and Nature Centre Siida. At the same time we will do maintenance in the public areas.

Due to the maintenance Siida and restaurant Sarrit will be closed Thursday – Monday, May 4^th – 8^th 2023. We will be open again regularly from Tuesday May 9^th onwards.

The last Sámi remains excavated from cemeteries in the Sámi homeland will be reburied in Inari and Utsjoki after the Sámi Church Days on 7–8 August. The deceased were laid to rest with funeral rites at the time of their burial, and the reburials will take place in a church ceremony following the order for the burial of the dead. The remains have been stored at the Sámi Museum Siida since 2001.

The Sámi remains will be interred at the cemetery on Vanhahautuumaasaari Island in Inari on Sunday 7 August 2022, and at Mantojärvi in Utsjoki and the Orthodox cemetery in Nellim on Monday 8 August 2022.

Events

On Sunday 7 August 2022 at 15.00, an event will be held in Inari at the lávvu reserved for the Sámi Church Days, where the programme will include telling the history of the remains. The reburial will take place at the cemetery on Vanhahautuumaasaari Island in Inari, where the remains and members of the funeral procession will be transported. At the lávvu, attendees will watch the reburial via live stream.

The events will continue on Monday 8 August 2022 at 10.00 in Utsjoki, where the remains will be reburied at the old cemetery at Mantojärvi. A coffee and discussion event for the funeral procession will be held in the churchyard.

The Skolt Sámi remains will be buried at the Orthodox cemetery in Nellim on Monday 8 August 2022 at an event starting at 15.00. A coffee and discussion event will be held for the members of the funeral procession at the Nellim clubhouse.

All of the events will be streamed live.

The reburial is an event that affects the entire Finnish and Nordic Sámi community. Similar events have been held earlier in the Sámi Homeland: on Vanhahautuumaasaari in Inari in 1995, in Alta, Norway in 1997, in Neiden, Norway in 2011 and in Lycksele, Sweden in 2019.

Committee responsible for the arrangements

The Sámi Museum Siida has set up a committee to handle the arrangements for the reburials. The members of the committee represent the Sámi Parliament (Leo Aikio, Anu Avaskari, Vuokko Hirvonen), the Skolt Sámi Siida Council (Hanna-Maaria Kiprianoff), the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Finland (Tuomo Huusko, Erva Niittyvuopio), the Sámi Work Committee of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Finland (Veli-Pekka Lehtola), the Orthodox Parish of Lapland (Jaakko Vainio), the University of Helsinki (Hanna Snellman), the Ministry of Education and Culture (Hanna Kiiskinen) and the Sámi Museum Siida (Minna Lehtola, Eija Ojanlatva).

Background

In 1995, the remains of 95 Sámi were returned to the cemetery on Vanhahautuumaasaari Island in Inari from the anatomical collection of the Department of Biomedicine at the University of Helsinki. At that time, the initiative for the reburial came from the Church Council of Inari Parish.

However, there were still other Sámi remains in the collection, and a committee established by the university took inventory of them. In 1998–1999, the committee discussed questions related to the ownership of the extensive collection of human skeletons collected in the 19th and 20th centuries and the principles of using the remains for research purposes. With regard to the Sámi remains, the committee also worked together with the Sámi Parliament.

As proposed by the committee, the Sámi remains in the anatomical collection of the University were repatriated to the Sámi homeland in 2001, to the Sámi Museum Siida in Inari. The Sámi Museum has stored the remains of 172 deceased persons appropriately since their repatriation. As agreed, permission to examine the remains has not been granted during that period.

Inquiries:
Eija Ojanlatva, Deputy Director of the Sámi Museum Siida, tel. +358 40 1676 145, eija.ojanlatva(at)samimuseum.fi

The opening of Sámi Museum and Northern Lapland Nature Center Siida’s new exhibition Enâmeh láá mii párnááh – These lands are our children, will be postponed until the beginning of June 2022.

We will be celebrating the new joint exhibition and the new and improved Siida on the 1^st of June, side by side with the beginning of the reindeer herding yearly cycle. By moving the opening, we want to make sure, that our exhibitions are finished with care and thus will serve our guests in the best possible way.

Before the opening of the new exhibition, Siida’s exhibitions are in the Sámi Museum’s open-air museum, and ticket prices are reduced. Also, all guided tours take place in the open-air museum, until the new exhibition has been opened.

Sámi museum’s customer service, ticket sales, Siida Shop, Metsähallitus’ customer service and tourist information will serve in a temporary building on the grounds of Siida, until the end of the renovation and from April 1^st onwards in the renewed lobby in Siida.

Restaurant Sarrit serves within Siida’s opening hours.

 

We are open

In winter 2021-2022 (Open-Air Museum, customer services, restaurant):
October 1st 2021 to March 31st 2022, Mon to Sat 10am to 4pm (closed on Sun)
*Christmas 2021: 24.12. 10-14, 25.12. 12-16)
April 1st to May 31st 2022, Mon to Sat 10am to 5pm (closed on Sun).

In summertime 2022 (renewed Siida):
June 1st to September 30th, every day from 9am to 6pm.

 

Located in Inari, Siida houses the Sámi Museum and Northern Lapland Nature Centre as well as Restaurant Sarrit. The Sámi Museum Foundation is responsible for operations at Sámi Museum. The Northern Lapland Nature Centre is part of Metsähallitus’ national network of nature centres.

More information: Head of Sales and Marketing Minna Muurahainen, +358 405816434, minna.muurahainen(at)samimuseum.fi

 

Sámi Museum and Nature Center Siida had 80 000 visitors in 2020. From these, 39 000 bought tickets to the exhibitions. In addition to exhibition visitors there are customers of Siida Shop, restaurant Sarrit, Inari tourist information and Metsähallitus customer service. The number of total visitors dropped 34 % and there were 39 % less exhibition visitors than the previous year.

The year 2020 had a great start at Siida. January 2020 broke records, but by the end of February the effects of Covid-19 started to show. On March 17th Siida, like all museums and nature centers in Finland, closed it’s doors for two and a half months. Summer was a success thanks to domestic travelling. Like previous years July was Siida’s busiest with over 8000 exhibition visitors. After the busy vacation months of summer, autumn and the last months of 2020 were quiet.

Sámi Museum and Nature Center Siida has always been an international destination. Year 2020 was clearly a year for domestic travel, as 66 % of exhibition visitors were domestic. On previous years on average 60 % of guests have been foreigners. The number of Museum Card visits grew almost double that of the previous year. In 2019 Siida registered 2 700 Museum Card visits, and in 2020 this number was 4 400.

Sámi Museum Siida’s Skolt Sámi Heritage House in Sevettijärvi had 990 guests in 2020. This year the Heritage House was open over a month less than previous years, in relation to this the number of visitors remained the same as before.

All in all Siida offered safe and high quality services despite the Covid-19 pandemic. In addition to the permanent exhibitions, the temporary exhibitions “Inari Sámi Handicraft of the Past and the Present”, “Changing winter”, “Everyday life of the North – how do the animals of the North live”, “Teno”, “Preserving Sámi Heritage”, “Albma olbmot – Real People”, ”Wild light”, “Sámi seremoniijat – Sámi ceremonies”, and “Karen Jomppanen: A Creative and Experimental Artisan” brought compelling content for visitors. Many of the guests from the past winter and summer also paid a visit to the open-air museum to get to know Sámi building heritage and livelihoods.

Siida buildings expansion project started in May 2020 as planned. The construction site hasn’t affected visiting Siida. In a little over six months the expansions for the new collections unit and restaurant wing have reached their full height and building on the inside is well on its way. The project is moving in schedule and the new facilities will be finished in spring 2021. In summer 2021 begins the renovation and renewal of Siida-building and it’s permanent exhibitions, which will be ready in spring 2022. During the renovation, exhibitions will be in the atmospheric open-air museum.

Sámi Museum and Nature Center Siida together with restaurant Sarrit want to thank all customers for the past year.

More information:

Head of Sales and Marketing Minna Väisänen, 0405816434, minna.vaisanen(at)samimuseum.fi
Sales and Marketing Assistant Taija Aikio, 0404847329, taija.aikio(at)samimuseum.fi

The Siida Building of the Sámi Museum and Northern Lapland Nature Centre is being extended and will get new collections facilities and a new restaurant wing. Construction started with excavation work in May 2020. Last week a digger revealed bones in a heat pipe pit at the building site. The bones are probably those of prisoners of war from World War II.

Siida’s on-site construction was launched in May. Extensive foundation excavations are being done at both ends of the Siida Building. Last week, an excavator revealed bones in the ground when digging pits for heat pipes. The Sámi Museum Siida’s archaelogist identified the bones as human bones, and the excavation in the pit was stopped immediately. Bones of at least three people have been found on the site. We can presume that they were prisoners of war.

The police was informed of the find, and the Museum’s archaeologist got permission to excavate the bones. After excavation, the police fetched the remains of the dead. The bones are being sent to Helsinki, to be studied in greater detail and for taking DNA samples.

An ancient site and a prison camp

In the vicinity of Siida, there is an ancient settlement site called Saamen museo / Vuopaja (“Sámi Museum / Oxbow Lake”), which is protected by the Antiquities Act (295/1963). The ancient site was taken into consideration already when planning the extension parts of Siida, to keep it intact for future generations.

We know that there was also a German prison camp with Soviet prisoners building a bridge over the river there. Thus, there are pits and remains of dugouts from the Second World War in the neighbourhood of Siida, and some of them have been covered by the buildings of Siida and the surrounding roads. The employees of the construction company have been given instructions on what to do if prehistoric or historic objects or structures are found in the ground.

More information: Eija Ojanlatva, Archaeologist, tel. +358 40 1676 145, eija.ojanlatva(at)samimuseum.fi

After a break, we will open the Sámi Museum and Nature Centre Siida for the public on Monday 1 June 2020 at 9 a.m. At the same time, we will launch the last year of the present Siida. We have started to extend the building, but visits to Siida will go on as usual throughout this year, until spring 2021.

A visit to Siida will turn out a pleasure, provided that we all – both visitors and staff – remember to come to Siida in good health and keep a proper distance to other people. Siida now has hand disinfection points in several places in the house, and we clean the building according to the guidelines of the Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare.

Siida will have exceptional opening hours in the 2020 summer and autumn season. From 1 June to 30 September, we will be open every day from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Thus, we will close an hour earlier in the evening than we have earlier told. From the beginning of October, we will keep our normal winter opening hours and serve visitors Tue–Sun from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.

During the opening hours, you can visit our exhibitions and Open-Air Museum. You can shop at Siida Shop, and the Customer Service of the Nature Centre will provide you with licences, advice and tourist information. Our Open-Air Museum will open as soon as the long winter is over and the snow is gone.

Temporary exhibitions will be opened one at a time. Until the end of September, you can visit our “Preserving Sámi Heritage”, which displays conserved items from the Sámi Museum’s collections, and the photography exhibition “Teno” by Pertti Turunen, a nature photographer from Ivalo. Right after Midsummer, we will open Pekka Sammallahti’s exhibition “Albma olbmot – Real People” of black-and-white portraits. This exhibition will be available in Siida for the public until the spring of 2021.

Siida Shop is getting ready to offer delivery sales, and you will soon be able to order selected products home by mail. We will tell about the progress of this reform on Siida Shop’s Instagram and Siida’s Facebook page.

At Restaurant Sarrit, visitors can refresh themselves on weekdays from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Lunch will be served from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m., and the restaurant will also offer take-away food. The number of customer seats has been reduced by fifty per cent, and the terrace will open as soon as the weather permits.

The Skolt Sámi Heritage House in Sevettijärvi, run by the Sámi Museum Siida, will be open this summer from 1 July to 29 August, Tue–Sat from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. The Heritage House is free for visitors. In Sevettijärvi, our exhibitions and open-air premises focus on the history of the Skolt Sámi. At the shop of the Heritage House, you will find, for example, local handicrafts.

You are most welcome to visit Siida!

 

Come to Siida only if you have no coronavirus symptoms.
Keep at least a 1–2 metre distance to other visitors and the staff.
Use hand sanitiser when you enter Siida.
You can find hand-washing facilities in our customer toilets.
To protect other people, cover you nose and mouth with tissue or your sleeve when coughing or sneezing.
We clean according to the guidelines of the Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare.
Thank you for following safety rules on our premises!

The renovation and extension project of the Sámi Museum and Northern Lapland Nature Centre Siida progresses as planned. The Senate Properties, which is the developer of the project, and Rekonen Ltd, which has been chosen the main entrepreneur of the extension, signed a contract on the construction on 11 May 2020. Construction will start immediately.

The Siida Building – inaugurated in 1998 – is renovated to meet the needs of an increased number of operations and higher visitor numbers. In the project, Siida will get museum and nature centre premises that fulfil modern demands both technically and operationally. The extension parts will cover approximately 1400 m², increasing Siida’s area by about 50 per cent.

The renovation and extension project will be carried out in two phases. The fresh competitive tendering for the contract concerned the first phase of the project, in which the Sámi Museum gets new collection facilities and a restaurant wing. With an extension of the Collections Unit, the new facilities will enable the Museum to continue as a national museum responsible for its special field. After the project, the Museum will receive a repatriation of the Sámi Collection of the Finnish National Museum (more than 2000 artefacts). A repatriation of this size is noteworthy even internationally. During the extension phase, Siida will continue serving its customers as usually.

The second phase of the construction project, starting in June 2021, will entail renovating Siida’s working facilities and repairing and carrying out construction, HVAC and electrotechnical repair and renovation measures. The main focus will be on securing good indoor conditions, on lighting, on acoustics and security solutions and on energy efficiency.

The Sámi Museum and Nature Centre and the restaurant will serve customers throughout the project, using the new wings as their temporary facilities. Siida with its new facilities and permanent exhibitions will be opened on 1 April 2022.

The architectural design of Siida’s extension has been entrusted to Architects Soini & Horto Ltd from Helsinki, with Senate Properties as the developer. LVI-Vanhatalo Oy will be the HVAC entrepreneur and Keskus-Veljet Oy the electrical entrepreneur of the project.

The Senate Properties’ Board of Directors decided to invest in the project in December 2019. The Sámi Museum Foundation is the main tenant of the Siida Building, and it sublets parts of the house to the Northern Lapland Nature Centre of Metsähallitus and to Restaurant Sarrit.

Further information:
Senate Properties: Miikka Teppo, Construction Manager, miikka.teppo@senaatti.fi tel. +358 40 180 0929

 

Senate Properties is the work environment partner and premises specialist of the Finnish government. We are a pioneer of new ways of working and work environments. Our centralised solutions help our customers improve their efficiency and save on premises costs. The skilled professionals of Senate Properties manage the government’s property assets and their efficient use. Senate Properties is also responsible for the sale and development of the properties no longer used by the government. Responsibility is at the core of all Senate Properties’ activities. We make room for success. www.senaatti.fi

Updated 18.2.2021: (2600 artefacts) –> (more than 2000 artefacts)

The Steering Committee Sápmi of the Interreg Nord Programme has granted support for a project called “Muittut, muitalusat – The Story of the Sámi by the Sámi”. The project is a collaboration of three Sámi museums – the Sámi Museum Siida from Inari, Finland (the leader and administrator), the Swedish Mountain and Sámi Museum Ájtte from Jokkmokk, and the South Sámi Museum and Cultural Centre Sáemien Sijte from Snåsa, Norway – as well as the University of Lapland and the Luleå University of Technology. The project period is 1.1.2020 – 30.9.2022, and the budget is approximately 2 million euros.

The partner museums hold a central position in the presentation and display of Sámi culture. The project will create a new Sámi museum language, through which Sámi culture will be presented in museums and exhibitions from the point of view of the Sámi themselves. One of the objectives of the project is to strengthen Sámi identity. Museums are important destinations in their areas, and the project will be of economic importance to the entire Nordic region. The objective is to guarantee that economic life, especially tourism, can benefit from the results when developing services and products.

In the project, a new Sámi exhibition language will be developed through three exhibition pilots. The pilots will have as their themes the Drum, the Sámi costume Gákti/Gapta/Gáppte, and the Loss of language. These three topics will be developed in terms of both content and display technique in cooperation with the project partners and the Sámi community in a series of workshops. The pilots will become a permanent part of the exhibitions of Sáemien Sijte, the Sámi Museum Siida and Ájtte.

A joint exhibition language will provide the participating Sámi museums with a strong foundation for future development work and cooperation across the borders. As a result of the project, Sámi culture and heritage will grow more vital. The results of the project will be shared internationally for the use of Sámi, museum stakeholders and museum visitors.

Eeva-Kristiina Harlin (M.A.) has started as the project manager of the project The Muittut, muitalusat – The Story of the Sámi by Sámi at the end of February.

 

More information about the project:

Sámi Museum Siida: Sari Valkonen, Museum Director  tel. +358 40 767 1052, sari.valkonen@samimuseum.fi
Ájtte: Elisabeth Pirak-Kuoljok, Museum Director tel. +46 97117007, elisabeth.pirak-kuoljok@ajtte.com
Sáemien Sijte: Birgitta Fossum, Museum Director tel. +47 940 17 020, birgitta.fossum@saemiensijte.no

Photo: A Sámi cradle, gietkka for a doll from 1920´s. Ahola collections/Sámi Museum Siida.