BERGSLIEN KUNSTMUSEUM
Bergslien Kunstmuseum (Bergslien Art Museum) is an organisation founded to establish an art museum dedicated to the works of artists Knud Bergslien and Brynjulf Bergslien in their hometown of Voss, Western Norway. The institution will showcase the works of the two artists and aims to highlight their position in Norwegian art history.
Knud Larsen Bergslien (1827–1908) was a painter who, from 1849 to 1852, studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Antwerp under Laurentius Dyckmann. Brynjulf Larsen Bergslien (1830–1898), brother of the former, was a sculptor who studied at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts in Copenhagen in the 1850s, where he worked with J.A. Jerichau and H.W. Bissen.
Both artists were interested in Nordic mythology and history as well as folk-life traditions and were central to Norwegian cultural life in the second half of the nineteenth century. Despite this, only a few of their works are currently on show in Norwegian museums today.
The Nordic Institute of Art collaborates with Bergslien Kunstmuseum to establish a permanent institution that aims to widen the knowledge of and scholarship on Knud Bergslien and Brynjulf Bergslien, while further contributing to our understanding of Scandinavian art and history in the nineteenth century.
In parallel to this project, Voss Sparebank Kunstsamling (Voss Bank Art Collection) is building an important collection focused on the two artists, including Knud Bergslien’s iconic painting “Birkebeinerne (Skiing Birchlegs Crossing the Mountain with the Royal Child)” (1869), which was unveiled at the inaugural Bergslien Seminar on August the 30th 2024.
Knud Bergslien, Birkebeinerne (1869),
Bergslien Kunstmuseum/Voss Sparebank Kunstsamling
Photo: Morten Henden Aamot