The Skovgaard Museum in Viborg, Denmark

Viborg, Denmark

Viborg , a town in central Jutland, Denmark, is the seat of both Viborg municipality and Region Midtjylland. Viborg is also the seat of the Western High Court, the High Court for the Jutland peninsula...

, situated in the former town hall from 1728 next to Viborg Cathedral

Viborg Cathedral

Viborg Cathedral, Our Lady Cathedral is the site of one of Denmark's most important historic churches located in the town of Viborg in northern Jutland...

, holds a collection of works by four generations of the Skovgaard family of artists.

The Permanent Collection

The main feature of the permanent collection is the work of the Skovgaard family. Peter Christian Skovgaard

P. C. Skovgaard

Peter Christian Thamsen Skovgaard , , Danish national romantic landscape painter, was born near Ringsted to farmer Tham Masmann Skovgaard and his wife Cathrine Elisabeth. He is one of the main figures associated with the Golden Age of Danish Painting...

 (1817-1875) was the principal representative of national romantic landscapes of the Golden Age of Danish painting.

His sons, Joakim Skovgaard (1856-1933), who created the mural

Mural

A mural is any piece of artwork painted or applied directly on a wall, ceiling or other large permanent surface. A particularly distinguishing characteristic of mural painting is that the architectural elements of the given space are harmoniously incorporated into the picture.-History:Murals of...

 decorations in Viborg Cathedral, and Niels Skovgaard (1858-1938) also worked with landscape painting. However, their work is characterized rather by Symbolism

Symbolism (arts)

Symbolism was a late nineteenth-century art movement of French, Russian and Belgian origin in poetry and other arts. In literature, the style had its beginnings with the publication Les Fleurs du mal by Charles Baudelaire...

 and burgeoning Modernism

Modernism

Modernism, in its broadest definition, is modern thought, character, or practice. More specifically, the term describes the modernist movement, its set of cultural tendencies and array of associated cultural movements, originally arising from wide-scale and far-reaching changes to Western society...

. The collection holds exquisite examples of landscape painting as well as religious and mythological subjects.

The circle of artists surrounding the Skovgaard family is also represented in the museum's collections, with works by, among others, the renowned Danish artists Niels Larsen Stevns, Viggo Petersen and Thorvald Bindesbøll

Thorvald Bindesbøll

Thorvald Bindesbøll was a Danish architect. He was one of Denmark's most important architects at the turn of the twentieth century....

.

Exhibitions

The Skovgaard Museum shows three to four temporary exhibitions a year, ranging from art from the beginning of the nineteenth century to contemporary art. The permanent collection is on display all year round.

External links

Official site