Gustav Vigeland

Gustav Vigeland (11 April 1869 – 12 March 1943) was a Norwegian sculptor. Born Adolf Gustav Thorsen, he is best known for the Vigeland installation in Oslo’s Frogner Park and for designing the Nobel Peace Prize medal.

He grew up in a family of craftsmen near Mandal in southern Norway. His father was a cabinetmaker, and one of his three brothers, Emanuel Vigeland, also became a notable artist. As a teenager, he went to Oslo to study wood carving, but his father’s death forced him back to Mandal to support his family. He lived for a time with his grandparents on a farm near the village of Vigeland. In 1888 he returned to Oslo, determined to become a sculptor. Sculptor Brynjulf Bergslien took him on as a student, and the next year Vigeland exhibited his first work, *Hagar and Ishmael*. In his twenties, he adopted the surname Vigeland, taken from the area where he had briefly lived.

From 1891 to 1896, he traveled to Copenhagen, Paris, Berlin, and Florence. In Paris he visited Auguste Rodin’s workshop, and in Italy he studied ancient and Renaissance art. During these years, themes of death and the relationship between man and woman first appeared in his work. His first solo exhibitions in Norway, in 1894 and 1896, received notable critical praise.

Until 1902, Vigeland worked on restoring Nidaros Cathedral in Trondheim. His contact with medieval art introduced another recurring theme: the dragon as a symbol of sin and a force of nature in conflict with humans. Back in Oslo, he was given an abandoned studio by the city. After Norway’s independence from Sweden in 1905, he received many commissions for statues and busts of famous Norwegians, including Henrik Ibsen and Niels Henrik Abel.

In 1906, Vigeland proposed a chalk model for a monumental fountain, initially intended for the square in front of the Parliament. The location sparked a dispute that delayed the project. While the dispute continued, Vigeland expanded the design, adding several sculpture groups. A tall granite column was added in 1919.

In 1921, Oslo decided to demolish Vigeland’s home to build a library. After a long dispute, the city gave him a new building where he could live and work, in exchange for donating all his future works—sculptures, drawings, engravings, and models—to the city. He moved into the studio on Nobels gate in the Frogner district in 1924. The studio was near Frogner Park, which he chose as the final location for his fountain. Over the next twenty years, he devoted himself to an open-air exhibition of his work, which became the Vigeland installation. It features 212 bronze and granite sculptures, all designed by Vigeland, culminating in the Monolith, a column with 121 figures struggling toward the top.

Vigeland lived and worked at his studio until his death in 1943. His ashes remain there, in the building’s belfry. Under the agreement with Oslo, the building became the Vigeland Museum. It sits just south of the sculpture arrangement, and his third-floor flat is preserved as part of the museum, which holds his plaster models and other works.

Some critics have linked Vigeland’s sculptures to Nazi or fascist aesthetics, comparing him to Arno Breker. In 1945, Pola Gauguin wrote in the newspaper *Verdens Gang* that the installation “reeks of Nazi mentality.” The works show figures in agony, shock, rapture, and torture, from birth to death and beyond. One assessment finds no political themes. During the German occupation, the head of the German administration’s Cultural Department requested a visit to Vigeland’s studio. Vigeland replied that he would “gladly” open it and “confidently dares to let German soldiers with their outstanding discipline walk around between my work.” The pro-Nazi Quisling regime used this response for propaganda, publishing it in the newspaper *Aftenposten* on 15 April 1944. This has led to accusations against Vigeland.