reopening

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On the 7 February 2020, the Museum of Copenhagen will reopen in its new home at Stormgade 18.

Close to the city hall in the centre of Copenhagen, the building by the architect H J Holm (1835-1916) dates from the 1890s.

Leth & Gori are the architects responsible for the restoration work and for work on the adjoining building at Stormgade 20 for offices for the museum.

Københavns Museum is now part of a city department for culture called Historie & Kunst / History and Art that includes Københavns Stadsarkiv / the City Archive, Thorvaldsens Museum and Nikolaj Kunsthal

Leth & Gori
Historie & Kunst /History and Art
the opening of the new museum
Københavns Museum / Museum of Copenhagen

 

reopening

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Frihedsmuseet / The Freedom Museum or Museum of Danish Resistance in Churchillparken, at the entrance to Kastellet, was destroyed in a devastating fire in 2013.

Fortunately, almost all of the collection was saved and a new museum has been built on the site. Designed by Lundgaard & Tranberg, the main galleries will be below ground.

The building above ground - with the entrance, the shop and cafe and staircases and lifts down to the exhibition space - is reminiscent of a concrete pillbox. Fine wires will support greenery as camouflage. The museum is expected to open on 5 May.

Lundgaard & Tranberg Arkitekter
Frihedsmuseet

 
 

the old Museum of Copenhagen

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the forecourt and the main range of the 18th-century building from Vesterbrogade

The Museum of Copenhagen will reopen in February but in a different part of the city - in a refurbished building on Stormgade close to the city hall - and there is now a growing controversy about the future of the building that they occupied on Vesterbrogade that is now vacant.

In the 1950s, the museum of the history of the city moved to this very fine house that dates from 1782 and was built as a new home for the Royal Copenhagen Shooting Society … a society had been established back in the 15th century to train citizens to defend Copenhagen. 

In the late 18th century, in their new building, outside the west gate of the city, there were gardens and shooting ranges that ran back from the house as far as the beach. However, in the 19th century, after the construction of the Copenhagen to Roskilde railway, that ran across the end of the shooting range and with the subsequent and rapid development of the west suburb, including apartment buildings on the south end of the shooting range and along what is now Istedgade, a high brick wall had to be built in 1887 across the end of the ranges to protect pedestrians walking across on the new road along the beach.

After the war, the Shooting Society moved out of the city to Solyst, north of Klampenborg, and the land and buildings on Vesterbrogade were acquired by the city. Much of the old garden and the shooting range behind the 18th-century house became what is now a very popular inner-city park and Vesterbro Ungdomsgård - a club and sports facilities for young people in this district - was built in 1952-53 across almost the full width of the garden and close to the back of the house so, although there is still an impressive forecourt towards the road, there is surprisingly little land behind the house for such a large and important historic property.

Inside, the house there are large and distinctive rooms with fine interior fittings so the property is protected and any new owner would be restricted in what they could do to the building and that could, in turn, limit how it is used.

Initially the building was offered on the commercial market for sale but, after some discussion, there is now a possibility that the house will either be retained by the city or it could be restored for a social or public function so that some public access would still be possible.

The battle now would seem to be between sections of the city administration who see the building as an important asset owned by and for the city that has to be kept in public ownership and control for the citizens and political factions who see it as financially astute to realise an asset that will have serious upfront and ongoing costs to restore and maintain but for now the building is unused and looks more and more unloved.

the gardens of the Royal Shooting Gallery

the old museum building from the air … the distinct grey-tiled roof with hipped ends of the main building from 1782 is approximately at the centre of this view with the forecourt towards Vesterbrogade running across at an angle at the top or north side of the view.
The L-shaped buildings and the square area of grass immediately below the old building are Vesterbro Ungdomsgård

photograph of the house and forecourt and the service range across the west side of the forecourt
Københavns Stadsarkiv, reference 20087

 

new podcasts from Designmuseum Danmark

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The Danish Design Museum in Copenhagen has just produced three podcasts in English as an introduction to Danish design. Click on the image here or on the link below to go to the page on the Designmuseum Danmark site.

These podcasts provide a really good general introduction to the history and to the evolution of modern design in Denmark and some context with a short history of the museum itself and an introduction to the teaching of design. Excellent if you are preparing to visit the museum or equally good if, following a visit, you are looking to understand more.

I hope this is a first step and they will publish more on line - podcasts and videos - because the design museum has excellent historic films and an archive of material produced for exhibitions that are important asa source for more information and as a starting point for further research.

Designmuseum Danmark - first podcasts

 
 

gingham - furniture under wraps

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A major exhibition on art in Denmark in the first half of the 19th century - the period described as the Golden Age of Danish art - has just opened at Statens Museum for Kunst / The National Gallery in Copenhagen.

It sets the paintings in the context of the political history of a period bookended by war and looks at the influence of the Royal Academy; at teaching; at the influence of travel as Danish artists went abroad, to Italy in particular, and looks at how the artists lived and worked … with paintings and drawings of artists at work in their studios.

The exhibition is an opportunity to look at paintings as a record of life in the city through that period, with paintings that record interiors and streetscapes that have gone or have been changed dramatically.

This painting by Martinus Rørbye from 1827 shows his teacher, The Painter Christian August Lorentzen and is on loan for the exhibition from the Nivagaard Collection.

Note the old arm chair that appears to have been covered originally in green silk but by the time it has been moved to the studio of the artist it appears to be permanently covered in its gingham slip covers.

In England, through the 18th century and at this period in the first half of the 19th century, wealthy landowners spent time away from their main houses in the country and, often for many months, lived in houses in London or they travelled “for the season” to cities like Bath or Harrogate or even to the seaside at Brighton, and when they were elsewhere, their homes were shut up and expensive furniture was usually protected with slip covers in calico or heavy cotton - often in gingham. There could even be long thin bags in the material that were drawn up around heavy silk curtains and secured at the top with tapes or plain ribbons. Presumably, in Denmark, the wealthy followed the same or similar habits of housekeeping but as silk covers got dirty or frayed - silk splits or breaks apart with strong sunlight - then these temporary covers that had been made to fit the specific chair, would have become more practical as permanent covers.

Note the construction of the chair with low-set and staggered stretchers between the legs … set higher at the front, where you tuck your feet back under as you stand up, and at the back than at the sides so the legs are not made weaker by putting the mortices for the ends of the stretchers too close together. The L-shaped arm rest is a crude precursor of the ‘classic’ mid 20th-century chair by Ole Wanscher.

The fur-lined leather slippers are fantastic.

Danish Golden Art - World-class art between disasters continues at
Statens Mueum for Kunst in Copenhagen
until 8 December 2019

detail of the painting by Matrinus Rørbye of The Painter Christian August Lorentzen

 
 

note:

Gingham is a distinct material with a small pattern of squares that is created in the weave and is generally in strong simple colours so red and white or blue and white or strong, deep yellow and white squares. It is popular throughout Scandinavia and, along with simple stripe patterns, gingham is probably most often used for curtains and covers in rural homes such as summer cottages or farmhouses.

the Adam Stool

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Sculpture is not just an important and useful record of historic styles of furniture and fashion ……

This is a bronze group by Gillian Wearing in the collection of Statens Museum for Kunst - the National Gallery in Copenhagen. With the title A real Danish family, it was produced in 2017, and that is the Adam Stool from the Copenhagen design studio FRAMA.

The shoes are fantastic but surely fashion historians a hundred years from now are going to wonder why collars on shirts were buttoned down and, even if they will work out that it was a feature designed initially to hold a neck tie neatly in place, they would wonder why he is not wearing a tie and as for men rolling up the cuffs and leaving their shirts hanging out … what was that all about?

Statens Museum for Kunst
FRAMA

 

the museum of the city

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The Museum of Copenhagen was founded in 1891. From 1925 the collection was housed in the attics at city hall but in 1956 the museum was established in the fine 18th-century buildings of the Royal Danish Shooting Society in Vesterbrogade.

The museum closed that exhibition space in 2018 and is in the process of moving into buildings on Vester Voldgade - immediately south of the city hall.

It was recently announced that the museum will not reopen before February 2020.

Københavns Museum / Museum of Copenhagen

 
 

DESIGN X CHANGE at Designmuseum Danmark

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Over the two days of the weekend for Design X Change 2019 at Designmuseum Danmark, there were lectures and demonstrations and a number of companies exhibited their products including the bicycle design company BIOMEGA with a display in the entrance court and, in Grønnegården - the great central courtyard of the museum - were, among many others, the new furniture company TAKT showing the first three chairs they have produced that were launched just a month ago; MATER; THE ORGANIC COMPANY; Signe Wenneberg with BIOTANISK KIOSK; sustainable bins from DROPBUCKET; planters from SQUARELY; jewellers from KEA - the Copenhagen Business Academy and COPENHAGEN SEEDS

 

 

DESIGN X CHANGE at Designmuseum Danmark
 Saturday and Sunday 4 and 5 May 2019

DESIGN X CHANGE at Designmuseum Danmark

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DESIGN X CHANGE, at Designmuseum Danmark today, is a major and popular annual event that is part of the Danish Design Festival.

There were demonstrations and displays in Grønnegården - the great courtyard at the centre of the museum - and lectures in the upper hall and all around the theme of sustainability in design.

DESIGN X CHANGE continue at Designmuseum Danmark tomorrow - Sunday 5 May 10.00-17.00

for information about companies and organisations taking part and for details about lectures see DESIGN X CHANGE

 

Fællesskab anno 2019 / Community anno 2019

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Catalogue for Biennalen for Kunsthåndværk & Design / The Biennale for Craft & Design 2019

The forward for the catalogue has been written by  Hans Christian Asmussen - designer and lecturer in design and on the board of Danske Kunsthåndværkere & Designere / the Danish Association of Craft and Design.

He discusses the growing importance of our sense of community and the eighteen projects chosen for the Biennale consider, in one way or another, our "notion of community - some with a critical voice, some in a playful tone, some tenderly, but all striving to explore the value that community offers."

This is about how artists, through their work, explore complex ideas, express what they feel and give the viewer reasons to think and reconsider by emphasising or challenging a view point or simply by shining a light on aspects of our lives that possibly we need to reconsider.

There is a longer essay on Community by the design historian and design theorist Pernille Stockmarr. She makes the crucial observation that with the frequent use of terms such as 'sharing economy', 'co-creation', ‘co-design', 'crowdsourcing', and 'crowdfunding', the concepts of community and cooperation have a strong and important relevance.

Historically, the concept of community is strong in Denmark with a well-established welfare state; a strong sense of family and friendship; a strong and ongoing role for the co-operative movement in retailing for food and household design and a strong volunteer movement through various sports and hobby associations.

In part, political change outside Denmark and the growing pressure to resolve threats to our environment has lead many to question what motivates us and those uncertainties make us reconsider our priorities and help us decide how we can move forward as local or wider communities.

read more

 

Langebro - a new museum

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Plans have been submitted to the department of Culture and Leisure for permission to create a new museum for Langebro with a new café in the substructure of the bridge on the Amager side.

There has been a bridge here since the 17th century but the present bridge designed by Kaj Gottlob was completed in 1954.

On the 17 January 2019 there will be a meeting about the bridge and the new museum at the nearby Kulturhuset down the harbour from the bridge and there is information about the bridge and about the proposed museum here.

 

Snedkernes Efterårsudstilling / Cabinetmakers' Autumn Exhibition 2018

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This week will be the last chance to see the exhibition of the furniture by cabinetmakers shown in the amazing interiors of Thorvaldsens Museum in Copenhagen

the exhibition continues until 9 December 2018

Thorvaldsens Museum,
Bertel Thorvaldsens Plads 2, 1213 Copenhagen

the first afternoon of the Christmas market at Designmuseum Danmark

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The Christmas market for design and crafts in the courtyard of Designmseum Danmark is organised as a collaboration between the museum and Danske Kunsthåndværkere & Designere - the Danish Association of Crafts and Designers. It is held on the first two weekends in December so on the 30th November and the 1st and 2nd December and on the 7th, 8th and 9th December 2018

Opening hours:
Friday: 12-17 
Saturday / Sunday: 10-17

The web site of Danske Kunsthåndværkere & Designere has a full list of the exhibitors.

Danske Kunsthåndværkere & Designere

Mød Vikingerne / Meet the Vikings

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A redesign of the exhibition space at the National Museum in Copenhagen for the display of their collection of Viking artefacts was opened officially yesterday.

A first small square gallery has an introduction to this new display with images of three warriors and larger than life images of the king Harold Bluetooth and Tova his queen with the reconstruction of a throne. There are important items from the museum collection but displayed along with rubber portrait heads.

In the main gallery beyond, one long wall has further large figures of characters from the Viking period with a merchant, a housewife and so on and with each given a pen portrait or short back story.

My first reaction was that I wasn't sure if I was being introduced to Vikings warriors who were the first competitors from an early version of the Roskilde Festival naked run - but with fancy head gear - or to hipsters who have been living in Vesterbro since 875 AD and to kings and queens who were unbelievably attractive people who had just had a sauna and scrubbed up well before going to the equivalent of a casting session at HBO or Netflix but in the 9th century.

But actually, although I'm being sarcastic, I'm not about to launch into an attack although there has been some heated discussions in the press over the last couple of days about how authentic the costumes are or if some artefacts have been shown together when they are not contemporary and much about where on their bodies Viking men had tattoos … or not.

These costumes and setting for the reconstructions are by the Danish designer and author Jim Lyngvild although the museum has been quick to emphasise that these are based on current academic reassessments although much has to be speculative because, for instance, fragments' of rich silks brought back from the middle east have been recovered from excavations but few garments.

However, on balance, it is a good attempt to make us, the visitor, look again at our view of Viking life and Viking culture and particularly if that view is confined to stories of long ships and warriors wearing horned helmets who headed off on raids to plunder and pillage.

The story here draws attention to trade, culture and governance and looks at just how far Danish traders travelled and just how much was brought home from not just Baltic neighbours but through trade and conquest of Northern England; from settlements in Ireland and then south through areas of France and by the Viking traders travelling through the Mediterranean to trade with the Middle East to bring back valuable goods from as far away as Persia.

But the exhibition is also careful to point out that the vast majority of the population stayed at home with the wealthy taking care of large estates farmed by peasants and servants. The role of women was more nuanced than we might assume for with men away trading or fighting, aristocratic Viking women may have had a large degree of freedom and power. The exhibition also looks at recent ideas on the role of women in these expeditions abroad. Women would have travelled with the fighting ships to form new settlements and although some may consider the idea of shieldmaidens as a myth, some warrior graves have been identified as female graves.

I learnt a lot. For a start Viking men seem to have been fastidious about grooming and in one excavation of grave goods they even found silver ear spoons. I actually looked but IKEA seem to have dropped them from their catalogues sometime since the 10th century.

the new exhibition is at Nationalmuseet, Prinsens Palæ, Vestergade 10, Copenhagen

Nationalmuseet  / National Museum

 

Brooches that were part of a hoard from Hornelund near Varde. The fine filigree work and the form of decoration with vine leaves indicate that they are by Danish goldsmiths and date from the second half of the 10th century. 

Hoard from Terslev in Zealand with silver weighing nearly 7 kg including an astounding 1,751 coins. Buried in second half of the 10th century. A large bowl may have come from Persia showing the huge stretch of Viking maritime trade.

Sword from 800-900 AD found in Søndersø Lake in Northern Jutland. It has elaborate decoration with silver thread and fragments of the scabbard suggest it was not lost in battle but was possibly part of an offering of thanks.

Christmas market at Designmuseum Danmark

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Recently received in a newsletter from Designmuseum Danmark … the dates for their Christmas market in the inner courtyard over two weekends.

Well worth putting in the diary or if you are thinking of visiting the city then a good time to be here.

Designmuseum Danmark

 

  • Friday 30 November 2018 – 12:00 to 17:00

  • Saturday 1 December 2018 – 10.00 to 17:00

  • Sunday 2 December 2018 – 10.00 to 17:00 

  • Friday 7 December 2018 – 12:00 to 17:00

  • Saturday 8 December 2018 – 10.00 to 17:00

  • Sunday 9 December 2018 – 10.00 to 17:00

 

the remodelled entrance courtyard for Designmuseum Danmark

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Major work on the entrance courtyard of the deign museum in Copenhagen has just been completed.

The gate piers and ironwork across the street frontage of the 18th-century building has been rebuilt, cobbles across the area re-laid, the entrance and ticket area for the museum has been moved out to a pavilion on one side of the courtyard along with a small coffee shop.

Five free-standing display cabinets have been constructed so that objects from the collection can be brought out from the museum to the forecourt and the first exhibition in this revitalised space has opened.

read more

SHARING - an exhibition to celebrate completion of work on the entrance court of Designmuseum Danmark

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Major work on the entrance courtyard of the deign museum in Copenhagen has just been completed.

The gate piers and ironwork across the street frontage of the 18th-century courtyard have been rebuilt; cobbles across the area relaid; the entrance and ticket area for the museum has been moved out to a pavilion on one side of the courtyard along with a small coffee shop.

Five free-standing display cabinets have been constructed so that objects from the collection can be brought out from the museum to the forecourt and the first exhibition in this revitalised space has opened.

For the first exhibition here on the entrance courtyard, new design is now being shown under the title SHARING. An information panel explains the ideas behind this major project and is quoted here in full ……. 

 

The works in these five new display cases on the entrance courtyard are ….

CLAYDIES
Ceramics by Karen Kjældgård-Larsen and Tine Broksø

KASPER KJELDGAARD
Dele al familien / Parts of the family 2018

MARGRETHE ODGAARD
Blå red violet / Blue Red Violet textile by Kvadrat

KIBISI / BIOMEGA Bjarke Ingels, Jens Martin Skibsted, Lars Holme Larsen
Elcykel / E-bike OKO Night Glow 2017

ASTRID KROGH
En firkant af universet / A Square of the Universe 2018 LED

L1310953.jpg
 
 

MONO - Snedkernes Efterårsudstilling / the Cabinetmakers’ Autumn Exhibition 2018

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Piqué
designed by: Hannes Stephensen
produced by: Snedkersind v/Kristian Frandsen

Sunrise
designed by: Lise og Hans Isbrand
produced by: MoreWood Møbelsnedkeri ApS

 
 

The Cabinetmakers Autumn Exhibition for 2018 has just opened at Thorvaldsens Museum in Copenhagen.

SE - Snedkernes Efterårsudstilling - The Cabinetmakers’ Autumn Exhibition - is an association of 81 designers and manufacturers. Each year their board select a venue for their exhibition and set a theme along with any specific rules for a particular year - often to do with dimensions but this year also stipulating colour - so each work will be restricted to just one colour with the choice limited to either the natural colour of the material itself or to one of the strong and distinctive colours used in the original decorative schemes of rooms in Thorvaldsens Museum.

Each year, guest designers and guest manufacturers can apply to show their work. 

When setting the theme for this year, MONO was suggested to imply a range of associated ideas through monochrome, monolith, monopoly and monologue.

A subheading for the exhibition - furniture shaped by craftsmanship and insight - is important and significant: these pieces highlight the skills and the experience of the cabinetmakers who, in some pieces, take their chosen materials to new extremes and, in all the works, push their workshop techniques to the highest level of quality. So the exhibition is in part about the style and the form of each work but because, the cabinetmakers also represent a long and well-established craft tradition in Denmark, these pieces are about understanding the materials, to know what can be done and how, and to use incredible skills to shape, finish, join, refine or reduce the parts that make each work.

There are forty one works in the exhibition. Most were produced in a partnership between a designer and a cabinetmaker or furniture manufacturer - in many cases a  partnership that is now well-established over many years and over several projects shown at the Autumn Exhibition although several pieces were both designed and made by the same person.

The exhibition is also an opportunity to experiment or to produce designs that might otherwise not be commissioned … the aim is not only to challenge the skill of the maker but also to challenge the preconceptions of the visitor.

 

the Autumn Exhibition continues at Thorvaldsens Museum until 9 December 2018

Thorvaldsens Museum
SE - Snedkernes Efterårsudstilling

Cupola drejestol / Cupola swivel chair
designed by: Niels Gammelgaard
produced by: Northern Layers

En stol / A chair
designed by: Foersom & Hiort-Lorenzen
produced by: Kvist Industries A/S

Introvert position
designed by: Andreas Lund
produced by: Toke Overgaard

Rum / Encircle
designed by: Troels Grum-Schwensen
produced by: Malte Gormsen

2Gether
designed and made by: Steen Dueholm Sehested

Bloom
designed by: Hannes Stephensen
produced by: Egeværk

Beside
designed by: Line Depping
produced by: Skagerak Denmark A/S

Guldlok / Goldilocks
designed by: Monique Engelund
produced by: Sune Witt Skovhus

 
 

MONO - exhibition catalogue

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The catalogue for the Cabinetmakers’ Autumn Exhibition in 2018 at Thorvaldsens Museum in Copenhagen has a general introduction to the exhibition by the selection board and then for each work there is a double-page layout with a full page black and white photograph for each of the works.

These monochrome images are dramatic and chime with the theme of the exhibition but also give a strong emphasis to the form of each work.

Some pieces have a descriptive or evocative name - so Calm or Look don’t touch and a cabinet for the display of special possessions has the title Ego - while other titles are more straightforward, with works described as Chair or Table and Chair.

Of course the catalogue sets out the name of the designer and the name of the cabinetmaker or the company who realised the work and each entry includes the materials and the dimensions of the piece.

There is also a short paragraph on each work to set out any thoughts that inspired the design or to talk about technical details - many of the pieces use material in an innovative way or the construction is much more complicated than is immediately apparent - and there is a translation in English.

Graphic design is by Studio Claus Due and the black and white photographs were taken by Torben Petersen.

Snedkernes Efterårsudstilling / The Cabinetmakers’ Autumn Exhibition 2018

Thorvaldsens Museum

Studio Claus Due