Sculptor Sigrid af Forselles is considered the main work of her five-part religious relief series The Evolution of the Human Soul, which depicts the struggle, evolution and final liberation of humanity. Its parts are entitled The Struggle of Man, Imprisonment, The Shrine of the Mountains, On the Way Home and Homecoming. All five parts were presented in Finland in 1908 at the second Women Artists' Exhibition. At the time, the work received a mixed reception from Finnish art critics, who considered monumental sculpture to be a field unsuitable for women artists.

The first part of the series, The Battle of Mankind, which refers to pagan mythology and the Ragnarok apocalypse of the Edda story, was purchased by the Antell Collection in 1909 and is now part of the collection of the Ateneum Art Museum. The remaining four volumes of the Bible, based on the Old and New Testaments, were donated by af Forselles' mother to the Kallio Church, which was completed a few years later.

The Imprisonment and the Sermon on the Mount are now on display in the church foyer, and The Homecoming and The Homecoming in the organ loft. The collection is said to have embodied af Forselles' theosophical view of a common core of all religions, but the separation of the first part made the other four suitable for the Christian church. The reliefs have never been cast in bronze, but remain in their original plaster casing.

Who was Sigrid af Forselles?

sigrid Maria Rosina af Forselles (4 May 1860 Lammi - 16 January 1935 Florence, Italy) was one of the first female sculptors in Finland. She worked and lived most of her life in Paris and Florence. Her teachers included the famous sculptor Auguste Rodin and Alfred Boucher. Af Forselles' main work is a five-part series of reliefs entitled The Evolution of the Human Soul, four of which are on display at Kallio Church in Helsinki.before Af Forselles, there had been only a few female sculptors in Finland.