NORWAY: NORSK FOLKEMUSEUM

I think I can, I think I can, I think I can . . .

I need to finish writing up our Scandinavian Trip of 2011 before we head to Prague (YIKES!) five weeks from today.  I think I can do it in three more posts, maybe two.

While in Oslo our tour group visited the Norsk Folkemuseum, an outdoor living history experience that shows typical Norwegian life from 1500 to the present. The open-air museum has over 150 buildings and many costumed workers and exhibitors.

The peaceful, richly-colored old town could have almost been one of the towns we drove through in the bus as we traveled through the country:

  

 My brother Dave would never be able to visit this town.  Too bad, Dave.

 Walking away from the town square was like walking back in time:

 

Notice the almost complete lack of windows on the house below.  When there is snow up to your roofline, a window is not a good thing.

 We did see a few windows, but they were usually up high and not too large:

All the people in costume "doing their thing" significantly enhanced our experience: 

One of the most photographed structures in the Folkemuseum is the Gol Stave Church, built in 1212.  It was saved from destruction in 1880 by the king and relocated to its current site.  There are only a handful of these wooden medieval churches left. Again, notice the lack of windows.  No brilliant stained glass here. 

Unfortunately, we were not able to go inside because just as we got there, guests began to arrive for a wedding.  I was really disappointed not to be able to experience the dark interior, but the seeing the surprisingly comfortable mix of old and new in the wedding party more than compensated for that:

This woman we could see through a window appeared to be the minister:

I recently ran across these words spoken by Kjell Magne Bondevik (a Lutheran minister and former Prime Minister of Norway who was very popular) that I thought were very appropriate for the blend of old and new we saw here:
"We have to find compromises.  That's the way it is in Norway."

On the other hand, Henrik Ibsen, Norway's most famous playwright, said:
"The devil is compromise."

I think in this particular case, I have to vote with the Prime Minister.

NORWAY: VIGELAND SCULPTURE PARK IN OSLO

It has been over six months since we returned from our trip to Russia and Scandinavia, and I still have a few more posts about Norway that I need to get up before I am finally done.  In "The Old Days" we would gather our photos and notes and create a trip scrapbook, and the mess on the kitchen table would motivate me to get it done.  You would think that the ease of using a computer would make digital scrapbooking a breeze, but as Martin Luther King noted, "All progress is precarious, and the solution of one problem brings us face to face with another problem."  No mess = No impetus to finish.

Well, I always tell my fledgling student writers, "Don't tell me what you are going to write about, just write!" And so, back to Norway.  Last July, I wrote a post about Oslo, the city and the churches, after the horrible shooting at a youth camp there. Now I am finally getting back to the many other beautiful sites of the city and the countryside.

One of my favorite places in Norway was Vigeland Sculpture Park. The park contains over 200 granite, wrought iron, and bronze sculptures of the various stages of human life, all of them created by one man: Gustav Vigeland, a Norwegian who lived from 1869-1943:

Vigeland is well known and much loved in Norway. Never heard of him? Chances are you have seen one of most famous works: The Nobel Peace Prize medal:

This ornate gate marks the entrance to the park:

A wide swath of neatly manicured lawn focuses all attention on the sculptures ahead:

It took Vigeland only twenty years to populate the park with his 212 sculptures.  They are all nude and somewhat block-like, purposely lacking the muscle definition and proportion present in Renaissance sculpture carved hundreds of years before, and yet they somehow capture a great deal of movement and beautifully depict the rich emotions of everyday life.

*Warning: By American standards, these are not G-rated sculptures.*

One of my favorites: an elderly father and his adult son. I loved the tender depictions of men.

In addition to these statues, there is a series of whimsical fountain sculptures with various figures playing in trees,

Around the base of the fountain are some wonderful friezes, again depicting different stages of life:

Children coming to earth

Death will separate even the most devoted of lovers

Poignant sculpture of two old men

If I had had a child with me, this pose would have been irrestible.

The most famous sculpture in the park is the 46-foot tall Monolith Totem, covered in 121 figures, all climbing towards the sky, a representation of man's reach for the spiritual and divine.

It took three stone carvers fourteen years to transfer the design from a plaster cast made by Vigeland to the stone. Vigeland died a year before its completion.