Gustav Vigeland

Oslo - 7/25

The last time I was in Oslo, some one in the office suggested that I might like to visit Frogner Park. She said it was a beautiful green place with nice sculptures, so one sunny Saturday I grabbed a book and took the tram over to the park. I was wholly unprepared for what I found; amazing park grounds with literally hundreds of bronze, granite, and wrought iron sculptures, the life work of one artist, Gustav Vigeland. Any one of the individual sculptures is captivating, seen all together, you are left mesmerized. Needless to say, that visit left a strong impression on me, and I always wanted to return and show Lisa the park.

In my opinion, Frogner park (also called Vigeland park) represents the ultimate coupe by an artist on his patron city. When Vigeland was reaching his prime as a sculptor, he made a deal with the city of Oslo - the city would build him a state of the art studio (for 1921) and residence, in return Vigeland would donate all of his work to the city, design the adjacent park, and after his death the studio and residence would become a museum. Oh, and Vigeland's ashes get to spend eternity in the museum tower. Considering the beauty of the museum, grounds, and park; I'd say Vigeland got a sweet deal.  He was able to live the rest of his life with no financial concerns, doing what he loved, working in a fully equipped studio with a staff of expert artisan stone carvers, iron workers, and model builders. He was a prolific artist and his legacy is the park.  Check out the photos.

Vigeland was inspired by mythology and most of his work in the park is based on the cycle of life. The granite statues that surround a monolith in the center of the park are especially moving and fun; starting with vignettes of children at play, through various stages of puberty, courtship, mid-life, before coming full circle to a pile of dead people. The statues themselves are just over life size, and the density and smoothness of the stone pull your hand to their surfaces. Children seem to be especially drawn to crawling all over them, and given the layout, clearly Vigeland had this in mind. 

Seeing the park again was an absolute treat. It was almost exactly how I remembered it, and where it wasn't it was better. There are very few places that just visually make my head spin, but Vigeland park is one of them. The photos here don't do it justice.

-- rob   

album 1, album 2