thorvaldsen's museum: a display of life and art, 1848–1984

14
The InternationalJournal of Museum Management and Curatorship (1984), 3, 237-250 Thorvaldsen’s Museum: A Display of Life and Art, 1848-1984 LISBET BALSLEVJP~RGENSEN On the opening day of Thorvaldsen’s Museum, in 1848, the architect, Michael Gottlieb Bindesboll, could rightly say that this work of his was unprecedented, and the design process of the Museum tells us much about the early concepts of a permanent exhibition of contemporary art housed in its own ‘tailor-made’ building. It was created in a period of national crisis. Denmark needed a symbol, a cultural monument to strength the national awareness, and the building of museums was then, as it is today, the contemporary means to achieve this end. The world-famous Danish sculptor, Bertel Thorvaldsen (1770-1844) who had lived and worked in Rome for four decades, the ‘Phidias of the North’, became the natural focus.’ Thorvaldsen’s biographer, Just Mathias Thiele, states that the idea of a museum first arose in earnest in 1827, when Thorvaldsen was about to buy the Palazzo Giraud in Rome for his voluminous art collection,2 and his compatriots had to win him for Copenhagen. In 1829 King Ludwig of Bavaria invited him to settle in Munich, and there was an offer from Stuttgart too, but Thorvaldsen managed to postpone his decision until 1837, knowing well that only the Danes could be relied upon to cherish his fame and his collections after his death. In Copenhagen he would have his own museum and there he was the ‘One and Only’, the ‘Glory of the Nation’. A museum for him became a matter of national concern and common interest. In the end his will clinched the matter: Thorvaldsen, in Rome, decided in the year 1837 that his works, collections and personal fortune should go to his native city and that with them there should be established a separate museum. From the very beginning Thorvaldsen preferred the young, inexperienced Bindesboll to the honoured Academy professors G.F. Hetsch and J.H. Koch, who of course coveted this important building project. With Bindesboll he could freely discuss plans and express his opinions on the lighting and spaces required for the sculpture, and there is no doubt that in Bindesboll he recognized a particular talent. To be strictly accurate, Thorvaldsen’s understanding of architecture as a whole was rather limited. His proposal, sketched by Bindesboll in Rome in 1837, was for a row of cells-one for each statue-modestly specifying only four walls and a good light. Like a telescope, the museum could be extended as required.3 Thorvaldsen’s idea has to be seen as an antidote to the lavish and unrealistic project which Bindesboll had sent to the Academy in Copenhagen in order to impress his colleagues and the committee: a Schinkelesque project in which he tried to surpass the Berlin Altes Museum. Thorvaldsen himself was afraid of the cost and he did not want to be outshone by the architecture. However, Thorvaldsen’s concept was new. Even today most artists’ demands for exhibition space are the same, instinctively regarding monumental architecture as a dangerous rival. Besides, a new perception of art had already been described: like Wackenroder the visitor should enjoy one piece of art at a time without being disturbed by other pictures crowding the walls. 0260-4779/84/03 0237-14 $03.000 1984 Butterworth & Co (Publishers)Ltd

Upload: lisbet-balslev-jorgensen

Post on 21-Nov-2016

212 views

Category:

Documents


0 download

TRANSCRIPT

Page 1: Thorvaldsen's Museum: A display of life and art, 1848–1984

The InternationalJournal of Museum Management and Curatorship (1984), 3, 237-250

Thorvaldsen’s Museum: A Display of Life and Art, 1848-1984

LISBET BALSLEVJP~RGENSEN

On the opening day of Thorvaldsen’s Museum, in 1848, the architect, Michael Gottlieb Bindesboll, could rightly say that this work of his was unprecedented, and the design process of the Museum tells us much about the early concepts of a permanent exhibition of contemporary art housed in its own ‘tailor-made’ building. It was created in a period of national crisis. Denmark needed a symbol, a cultural monument to strength the national awareness, and the building of museums was then, as it is today, the contemporary means to achieve this end. The world-famous Danish sculptor, Bertel Thorvaldsen (1770-1844) who had lived and worked in Rome for four decades, the ‘Phidias of the North’, became the natural focus.’ Thorvaldsen’s biographer, Just Mathias Thiele, states that the idea of a museum first arose in earnest in 1827, when Thorvaldsen was about to buy the Palazzo Giraud in Rome for his voluminous art collection,2 and his compatriots had to win him for Copenhagen. In 1829 King Ludwig of Bavaria invited him to settle in Munich, and there was an offer from Stuttgart too, but Thorvaldsen managed to postpone his decision until 1837, knowing well that only the Danes could be relied upon to cherish his fame and his collections after his death. In Copenhagen he would have his own museum and there he was the ‘One and Only’, the ‘Glory of the Nation’. A museum for him became a matter of national concern and common interest.

In the end his will clinched the matter: Thorvaldsen, in Rome, decided in the year 1837 that his works, collections and personal fortune should go to his native city and that with them there should be established a separate museum. From the very beginning Thorvaldsen preferred the young, inexperienced Bindesboll to the honoured Academy professors G.F. Hetsch and J.H. Koch, who of course coveted this important building project. With Bindesboll he could freely discuss plans and express his opinions on the lighting and spaces required for the sculpture, and there is no doubt that in Bindesboll he recognized a particular talent. To be strictly accurate, Thorvaldsen’s understanding of architecture as a whole was rather limited. His proposal, sketched by Bindesboll in Rome in 1837, was for a row of cells-one for each statue-modestly specifying only four walls and a good light. Like a telescope, the museum could be extended as required.3 Thorvaldsen’s idea has to be seen as an antidote to the lavish and unrealistic project which Bindesboll had sent to the Academy in Copenhagen in order to impress his colleagues and the committee: a Schinkelesque project in which he tried to surpass the Berlin Altes Museum. Thorvaldsen himself was afraid of the cost and he did not want to be outshone by the architecture. However, Thorvaldsen’s concept was new. Even today most artists’ demands for exhibition space are the same, instinctively regarding monumental architecture as a dangerous rival. Besides, a new perception of art had already been described: like Wackenroder the visitor should enjoy one piece of art at a time without being disturbed by other pictures crowding the walls.

0260-4779/84/03 0237-14 $03.00 0 1984 Butterworth & Co (Publishers)Ltd

Page 2: Thorvaldsen's Museum: A display of life and art, 1848–1984

238

1. Michael Gottlieb Bin- desboll: Project for Thorvaldsen’s Museum, Copenhagen, pen and ink and wash over pencil, 29.2 x 34.8 cm, Kunst- akademiets Bibliotek, Copenhagen. Executed in Rome in 1837, follow- ing the advice of Thor- valdsen, the so-called ‘telescope project’ marked a dramatic change in relationship between the museum building and the works of art it was designed to contain.

But what should a museum for contemporary art look like? Antonio Canova had already built himself a pantheon-like temple in his native village ofpossagno (1819-1833).4 Since the eighteenth century it had been the aim of every capital, no matter how small, to have a

pantheon. The Pantheon of Copenhagen, the Frederik’s Church, had never been finished and the site had been abandoned. Like a Roman ruin it was waiting for a Danish Valadier to demonstrate that ‘the present could conquer the past’. It could turn out to be like one of Valadier’s projects for a Canova sculpture museum in the Roman style or a Camuccini

pinacoteca in the Egyptian style,’ or perhaps look like Schinkel’s museum in Berlin or Leo von Klenze’s Glyptothek in Munich or the Walhalla in Regensburg. All these projects and museums are temples or pantheons and they recall more or less the display scheme of the Vatican Museo Pio Clementino (1776) in which the sculpture was merely part of the interior decoration. This principle Thorvaldsen had already rejected when he refused to allow his statues of the Apostles to be engaged into the nave pillars of the Church of Our Lady in Copenhagen (1821). He wanted architecture and sculpture to be equal in value. To obtain plans for the museum, the Art Association (Kunstforeningen) promoted in 1834 a competitionh for a building on the site of the Frederik’s Church to ‘satisfy the claims both on taste and utility whether it should be a church or another kind of official building’. The colicept of a pantheon presented itself in the unfinished circular building for which C. F. Harsdorff had made a well-known project in 1797.’ Professor Hetsch was the only one to deliver. His entry, ‘a Temple for the Arts, a Temple of Honour for men of Merit’, with the motto: ‘Works of Art are the Honour of the Country’, was certainly professional, but far too expensive and the programme recalled that of von Klenze’s Walhalla-it was not a museum.

In 1833 Bindesbsll had been awarded the Academy’s Travelling Grant. He left Denmark in July 1834 and did not have the time-or resources by then-to be able to enter the competition. However, a sketchplan, signed G.B. 18.4.1834, demonstrates his early interest in this task. A drawing by Hetsch after Bindesboll, dated 24.2.1834, which could reflect the museum project Bindesboll exhibited at Charlottenborg in 1834 with the title ‘Sketch

Page 3: Thorvaldsen's Museum: A display of life and art, 1848–1984

LISBET BALSLEV JC~RGENSEN 239

2. M.G. Bindesboll: Elevation and section through the courtyard of the first project for Thorvaldsen’sMuseum, K.B., Copenhagen. This project was sent by Bindesball from Rome in 1837 to the Academy in Copenhagen and, strongly influenced by Schinkel, it was evolved before his detailed discussions with Thorvaldsen.

i.--_..L__. “___ <A’”

drawing for a building fit for Thorvaldsen’s works’, is further proof. These two projects have three halls with ranges of smaller and larger studios on the long sides and both ground plans indicate the site of the coach-house next to Christiansborg Castle without

considering the existing building. The fact that Bindesboll was already able in 1834 to present the display the way Thorvaldsen wanted it was most likely due to the sculptor H. E. Freund, Thorvaldsen’s assistant in Rome, who is said to have been the first to recommend small rooms with studio lighting, ’ but they could also both have been influenced by Schinkel’s Altes Museum, where the display of paintings in small sections allowed the visitor to ‘abandon himself to one masterpiece’. The display of sculpture, however, did not differ greatly from the Pio Clementino Museum and its Rotonda. Bindesball’s projects are all influenced by Schinkel and we can observe how difficult it was for him to abandon the pantheon-element which was so suitable for Christ and the Twelve Apostles. On his first journey (1822-1823), Bindesboll had stayed for half a year in Paris where he met the German architect Frantz Gau. Bindesbell’s brother attests that Gau had been most influential with

respect to Pompeiian architecture,” and knowing that Gottfried Semper had dedicated his book, Vorliiufige Bemerkungen iiber bemalte Architektur und Plastik bei den Alten, to his ‘honourable teacher and friend Mr Gau’,‘” it is very likely that Bindesbell’s interest in

3. M.G. Bindesboll: Plan of the first pro- ject for Thorvaldsen’s Museum (1837), K.B., Copenhagen (taken from Bruun and Fenger, op. cit.). Thorvaldsen re- jected the project on grounds of cost and his wish for the sculpture not to be overwhelmed by the architecture.

Page 4: Thorvaldsen's Museum: A display of life and art, 1848–1984

240 Thorcaldsen’s Museum: 1848-1984

4. G.F. Hetsch: Perspective View and Plan of the Competition Design for Thorvaldsen’s Museum (1834) pen and ink and watercolour, 64.8 x 49 cm, K.B., Copenhagen.

polychromy had been awakened already in Paris. Furthermore, Semper had, in 1834, built a small polychrome garden pavilion in Altona to house a collection of Thorvaldsen and H.V. Bissen marbles formed by the banker Donner. ” Here the principle of display was ‘ein

ringsum einfallendes oberes Seitenlicht’.” Polychromy had become indispensable.13 Even Hetsch’s competition entry had a moderate polychromatic scheme and in his description he recommended red-curtained windows and stained glass in the top of the rotonda to give life to the white marble.“’

On his second journey (1834-1839) Bindesball took a great interest in polychrome architecture. He visited scholars in Germany, studied Schinkel’s and Leo von Klenze’s buildings and he may have noticed that in the Glyptothek in Munich the rooms were decorated with frescoes corresponding to the display and that the floors were paved with various designs. Klenze wanted the whiteness of the marbles to stand out against a coloured wall and Bindesboll agreed with Klenze that colour unites all times and all peoples.‘5 Bindesboll’s drawings from Greece (1835-1836) demonstrate the interest he took in every polychrome fragment discovered on the Acropolis. There he found the genuine colours. The clear red, blue and green recur afterwards in his projects and in the museum erected.

In Rome Thorvaldsen stated that in his view sculpture in a museum should be seen under the same lighting as that in the artist’s studio. Side-lighting for reliefs, and a high and broad source providing light from one direction only for statues since more than one source of light prevents the most favourable perception of form. In Rome he saw the new architecture and learned that now it was permissible to use a free-style classicism, to mix Roman, Greek and

Page 5: Thorvaldsen's Museum: A display of life and art, 1848–1984

LISBET BALSLEV JORGENSEN 241

5. G.F. Hetsch: Elevation and Plan

/,

.

.

. t * I

.

.

,

.

.

.

e

.

1 I

6. M.G. Bindesbell: Project for Thorvald- sen’s Museum, dated 19 April 1839, pen and ink and watercolour over pencil, 32 x 42.8 cm, K.B., Copenhagen.

of Project for Thorvaldsen’s

Museum on the site of the Frederik’s Church, signed and dated 28 January 1837, pen and ink and wash over pencil, 50 x 32.4 cm, K.B., Copen- hagen and exhibited there in 1838.

Page 6: Thorvaldsen's Museum: A display of life and art, 1848–1984

7. M.G. Bindesbell: Project for Thorvaldsen’s Museum, dated 1837, pen and ink and wash, 33.6~ 28.5 cm, K.B., Copenhagen. Sent from Rome in a letter to his uncle, Jonas Collin, 8 August 1837.

8. M.G. Bindesboll and H.V. Bissen: Ground plan of Thorvaldsen’s Museum with the disposi- tion of the principal sculptures, signed ‘G Bin- desboll’, pen and ink and wash, 99 x 64 cm, K.B., Copenhagen.

Page 7: Thorvaldsen's Museum: A display of life and art, 1848–1984

LISBET BALSLEV JORGENSEN 243

Egyptian styles from all periods . . and he most certainly admired the new Etruscan yellow ochre since he subsequently used it for his museum.

In 1837 Bindesboll declared in a letter from Rome, that he now knew what Thorvaldsen wanted and that he was working very hard to satisfy him. He also mentioned the pretentious project he had sent to the Academy and asked his uncle not to regard it as a museum but as a portico for pleasure and ease for the visitors, decorated with Thorvaldsen’s sculptures. He consciously regarded art as an adornment to life. A far more realistic design for a museum was

included in this letter with the following explanation:

After Thorvaldsen’s advice it contains some smaller and larger studios for his works and on the first floor there are suites of rooms for his collections. The faqades are very simple but monumental as required for a museum. Though I have worked a lot on the interior decoration I have not suggested anything because there are so many opinions of that but I have indicated the size of a couple of statues and windows and planned the light as high and broad as in Thorvaldsen’s studio.‘”

Both Thorvaldsen and the committee were pleased with this proposal and the sculptor answered the questions as to which site he wanted with: ‘Any free site with a pure light will do but I still find this museum too expensive, four walls and a good light is all I need’.” To satisfy Thorvaldsen and to demonstrate how impossible the idea was, Bindesboll sketched

the ‘telescope-museum’ in plan and section and wrote to his uncle, Jonas Collin, the Chairman of the Committee: ‘If it is going to be a museum the beauty of the house can not be neglected’.18

Bindesball had his vision and so had the art historian N.L. Heyen. The architect saw all his

9. M.G. Bindesbell: Main faqade of Thorvaldsen’s Museum (1839-1848) before the restoration of

the frieze.

Page 8: Thorvaldsen's Museum: A display of life and art, 1848–1984

24-l Thor~aldsen’s Museum: IX#i-y-1984

10. Entrance Hall of Thorvaldsen’s Museum, Copenhagen, with Paul Henningsen’s electric light- ing and a baffle curtain on the end wall (1932).

11. Entrance Hall of Thorvaldsen’s Museum before the insertion of electric lights by Paul Henningsen (1932). The hall is now occupied by a new sales desk designed by Jorgen Bo.

artist-friends decorating the Museum and Hoyen saw the didactic effect the building would have on the people, not only as a place for general art education but also as a workshop for craftsmen and artists. Copenhagen with all its neoclassical buildings, and now this Museum in construction, would be the Athens of the North. Every Dane should contribute something to this monument. It was a Grundtvigian education in democracy. When in 1839 the site was approved, the architect appointed and work begun, the emblematic character of the Museum increased as the seas of the national enthusiasm ran higher. The aim was: ‘not for dead splendour but to sharpen the awareness of beauty and the significance of art’. Every architectonic motif, the interior and finally the exterior decoration tell a story about European history and human life in which Thorvaldsen, of course, takes the leading part. The compilation of historical and mythical references was intended to give the visitors the stimulation they needed, increase their psychological growth and strengthen their national

Page 9: Thorvaldsen's Museum: A display of life and art, 1848–1984

LISBET BALSLEV JBRGENSEN 245

and personal ego. For that purpose the legibility of the building was essential. It was a museum for and by the people and the exterior decoration was, according to the architect, ‘an invitation to the man in the street and the vestibule a gateway to enjoyment’. The ordinary people pictured Qn the faqades were barefooted and dressed in workclothes, dragging the statues into the museum. It was a new realism that shocked the respectable citizens.” Visitors, however, were expected to wear their Sunday best and wooden shoes were forbidden. Critics saw a contradiction between the heroic language of the architecture and the prosaic every’day style of the frieze.

Thorvaldsen’s art collection consists mainly of contemporary paintings acquired in Rome from about 1800, and at his death he owned 356 items. 20 N. L. Hoyen was allocated the difficult task of arranging the display. A great many of the paintings were gifts or

Thorvaldsen had bought them out of kindness. Hoyen considered side-light indispensable for paintings as for reliefs, and wanted the rear walls facing the windows as background for minor statues. He wanted these rooms to be almost as intimate as a living-room, and the side walls not to be overfilled as in a contemporary museum. The best background colour for the paintings was dark red, in accordance with the results gained from earlier experiments. Hayen consequently sorted out 80 paintings for the display, but the committee regarded his selection as an insult to Thorvaldsen’s taste and Hoyen was dismissed. At the opening 315 paintings were on display. 2’ The sculpture was arranged by Bindesboll and H.V. Bissen. Each statue received an individual pedestal proportioned relative to the size and the height of the window-sill. Shortly after the opening in 1848 the first curator, Ludvig Miller, produced a catalogue with an explanation of the building and a list of the works on display. He announced in the preface the future publication of a comprehensive catalogue (1847-1850). He also promised that the basement would be prepared for the plaster-cast collection as soon as the roonls were dry enough.*?

When re-reading the first catalogue from 1849 we realize that the collections are for the most part still in situ. From the very beginning the public found the interor too dark, not understanding that perception of colour and space is related to the intensity of the daylight

12. Thorvaldsen’s Mu- seum, Corridor 3 of basement with the first electric lighting and storage display (1923) before Jergen Bo’s reor- ganization (1968-1973).

Page 10: Thorvaldsen's Museum: A display of life and art, 1848–1984

13. Thorvaldsen’s Mu- seum: ground-floor suite of rooms alongside chan- nel-‘a small room, one for each statue’.

and, alas!, Denmark is not Italy. The critics compared the light colours of the Pio Clementino Museum to what they called the dark and gloomy walls of Bindesboll’s building. Public demands for increased lighting are today still a threat to Bindesbmll’s architecture and Thorvaldsen’s conception of light. The curator managed to avoid gas-light, but in the early 192Os, when people were accustomed to electric light in their homes, even Thorvaldsen’s Museum had to bring in this modern invention. The electric fittings have been a problem ever since. Strong demands from ignorant but benevolent parties involved, and now the security staffs legal right to participate in the decision-making process, put forward requirements that are a disaster for the architecture. The general complaints are about

14. Thorvaldsen’s Museum, display ofcasts in basement room 59 in 1913. This room is now used for storage.

Page 11: Thorvaldsen's Museum: A display of life and art, 1848–1984

LISBET BALSLEV JQRGENSEN 247

draughts and darkness; and no matter how ingenious the designs, modern lamps and heaters

violate the architecture. Electric lights in vaulted, decorated rooms make the original plaster models look dirty and the marbles flat. The only possible artificial light could be a revival of the nineteenth century ‘living sculpture’ performances, when visitors, torch in hand, made the shadows dance. The Thorvaldsen Museum was scheduled as a national monument in 1944 and could as such be protected against modern infringements, but is it possible today to make a mid-nineteenth century display scheme attractive to the public?

The basement store-rooms were reorganized from 1913 to 1930. The floor, the walls and the casts had all been affected by humidity. The best architects of the time, Carl Petersen and Kaare Klint, worked out plans for the restoration. Carl Petersen, who died in 1921, made an outstanding contribution to the revival of interest in Neoclassical architecture. His Faaborg Museum, built in 1912-1915, was the turning-point, and Bindesboll’s Museum was his

source of inspiration. There he taught his students about the effects of light, colour, material and form in space-principles Danish architects have observed ever since.?” Kaare Klint’s display of less important works in the basement (1926) followed Bindesboll’s scheme for colours and pedestals. On the first floor he designed exhibition cases for Thorvaldsen’s sketch models and furniture for the curator’s office; and the increasing sale of catalogues and postcards called for a desk at the entrance. 24 Kaare Klint’s reorganization of the basement survived until 1967, when the effect of humidity was again too obvious. The sallow light from the once so-radiant PH-lamps intensified the impression of decay, and the Museum had the reputation of being dark, dusty and dead (except among architects).

To get rid of the dry rot and mould, and to increase the attraction of the collections to visitors, the curator, Dyveke Helsted, saw the basement as the only possible space in which to

15. Curator’s Office in Thorvaldsen’s Museum with furniture designed by Kaare Klint (1926).

Page 12: Thorvaldsen's Museum: A display of life and art, 1848–1984

248 Thortuldsen’s Museum: 1848-1984

16. Ground plan of basement of Thor- valdsen’s Museum and the reorganization un- dertaken by Jorgen Bo in 1968-1973. Plan 1: 200. K<)l: 1. Thor- valdseniana; 2. Thor- valdsen’s collection of antiques; 3. Thor- valdsen’s sketches; 4. Changing exhibitions.

arrange temporary exhibitions and an up-to-date display of Thorvaldsen’s drawings and sketch models. The small scale of these rooms could emphasize an intimate approach to the process of creation of the works in Bindesboll’s display on the upper levels. The right architect could change the image of the gloomy cellar to that of a treasury. The architect chosen for this task was Jorgen Bo. Carl Petersen said in his lecture on ‘Contrasts’ (1920): ‘to give emphasis, the contrast must be simple and strong’, and about interior dimensions he

said: ‘the secret is that we always unconsciously perceive things in relation to the size of the human body. This is what we call the golden standard. A consciously working artist must have knowledge of these rules.’ Carl Petersen had learnt all that in Bindesboll’s Museum. The contrast between the ground floor and the basement had to be strong. Walls and vaults were whitewashed and the floor was covered with a dark blue carpet and paved with polished limestone. The daylight was shut out by linen-sized screens and the objects were reduced in numbers in order to make the message simple and clear. Many experiments with different types of lighting fixtures were made to balance light and shadow in the small roomszi Hebe,2h a Thorvaldsen marble statue from 1806, gave her name to a new design of electric light for the basement. In this context the visitor can be aware of the marble texture: Thorvaldsen’s marble draws the light like the softest silk.

17. Corridor 3 of base- ment of Thorvaldsen’s Museum reorganized by Jergen Bo (1968-1973).

Page 13: Thorvaldsen's Museum: A display of life and art, 1848–1984

LISBET BALSLEV JQRGENSEN 249

The conversion of the basement did change the image of the whole museum. The contrast between old and new proved to be favourable to both, but would it be possible to remove the electric light from Bindesboll’s display? Until now the most satisfactory solution is an adjustable quartz-halogen lamp designed by Jergen Bo to give light to the decorated vaults and thus reflected light to the sculptures.

Bindesbell’s Museum, with its furniture and display, is the very beginning of modern Danish design.*’ In this Museum later generations of architects have learnt the rules of texture, contrasts and colour, and they still do. These rules are the fundamental concept of a living tradition handed down from Thorvaldsen and Bindesboll, Carl Petersen and Kaare Klint to the present.

Acknowledgements

Illustrations are reproduced by kind permission of the following: Samlingen af Arkitektur- tegninger, Kunstakademiets Bibliotek, Charlottenborg (1-7, 9); Archive of Thorvaldsen’s Museum (8, l&16); and Ole Woldbye (17, 18).

Notes and References

1. Ludvig Mtiller, Thorvaldsen’s Museum (Copenhagen, 1849, first catalogue); Lisbet Balslev Jorgensen,

‘Thorvaldsen’s Museum, a National Monument’, Apollo, 1972, pp. 24-31.

2. C. Bruun and L.P. Fenger, Thorvaldsens Museums Hutorie (Copenhagen, 1892); Henrik Bramsen, Gottlieb Bindesbnll (Copenhagen, 1959).

3. Op. cit. Note 2, p. 13, a letter from Bindeshell, 8 Aug. 1837.

4. Melchiorre Missirini, Del Tempio eretto in Possagno da Antonio Canova (Venice, 1833).

5. Giuseppe Valadier, Progetti architettonici per ognt specie di fabbriche in stili ed usi dzoersi (Rome, 1807).

6. Kunstgoreningen i Kobenhavn dens Historie og Virksomhed (Copenhagen, 1864), pp. 1618.

7. Frederik Weilbach, Architekten C.F. Harsdorfl(Copenhagen, 1928), pp. 2522257.

8. Manus, Description of projects 1 and 2, 15 June 1839 (Th.Mus.); Victor Freund, Hermann Ernst Freunds Levned (Copenhagen, 1883), p. 220; K.F. Schinkel, Sammlung Architektonischer Entzuiirf (Berlin), available in the Academy Library since 183 1. 9. Vilhelm Wanscher, Artex, I, 1932, p. 150: letters from and to Bindesboll abroad.

10. G. Semper, Vorki’ujige Bemerkungen (Altona, 1834): was in the Academy Library from 1835.

11. Leopold Ettlinger, Gottfried Semper und die Antike (Diss. Halle, 1937). 12. Bramsen, op. cit. Note 2, p. 97; H. Semper, Gottfrred Semper (Berlin, 1880), p. 9.

18. Corridor 2 of base- ment of Thorvaldsen’s Museum reorganized by Jorgen Bo (1968-1973) with new ‘Hebe’ electric lights.

Page 14: Thorvaldsen's Museum: A display of life and art, 1848–1984

250 Thoraaldsen’s Museum: 1848-1984

13. David van Zanten, The Architectural PoJychromy qfthe 1830s (London, 1977), pp. 15(&212. 14. G.F. Hetsch, Description of competition entry, 28 Sept. 1834; Manus, in Kunstakademiets Bibliotek,

Samlingen af Arkitektustegninger.

15. Leo von Klenze, Sammlun~ Architektonischer Entwiirfi, IIeft I (Munich, 1830), pp. 2-7: available in the

Academy Library since 1831. 16. Wanscher, op. cit. Note 9, pp. 178, 180; Bruun and Fenger, op. cit. Note 2, p. 11; Bindesbell to Jonas Collin,

24 June 1837.

17. Wanscher, op. cit. Note 9, p. 182; Thorvaldsen to Jonas Collin, 24 Oct. 1837.

18. Wanscher; op. cit. Note 9, p. 182; Bindesbell to Jonas Collin, 8 Aug., 1837; Bruunand Fenger, op. cit. Note 2,

p. 13.

19. Thorvaldsen’s Museum, collection of press cuttings.

20. Dyveke Helsted in Apollo, Sept. 1972, pp. 32239.

21. J.L. Ussing, N.L. Hoyens Lecned (Copenhagen, 1872), pp. 274-302; Berlingske polrtiske og Averissements- Tidende, 2 Dec. 1848: Troels Lund about the display of paintings.

22. L. Miiller, Thorvaldsens Museum, Haandkatalog for de Besogende (Copenhagen, 1849).

23. Nordic Classicism 19/&1930, exhibition catalogue from the Museum of Finnish Architecture (Helsinki,

1982), pp. 29-54, 69970; Carl Petersen’s lectures from 1919 and 1920 on ‘Texture and Contrasts’ (Eng.).

24. Klint’s furniture for Thorvaldsen’s Museum is now in the Museum of Arts and Crafts, Copenhagen. 25. Kim Dirckinck-Holmfeld, ‘Nyindretningen af underetagen i Thorvaldsens Museum’, Arkitektur (DK), vi,

1981, pp. 223-226; Lisbet Balslev Jorgensen, ‘Jorgen Bo som museumsarkitekt’, Museumsmagasinet, 17 Sept.

1981, pp. 336.

26. Hebe, marble (1806) for Mr Sam Buddington: acquired in 1938 from William Randolph Hearst’s collection.

27. Meddelelser fra Thorvaldsens Museum, 1948 (Copenhagen, 1948); Mogens Koch, M. G. Bandesbells moblev i Thorvaldsens Museum, pp. 71-83; Sigurd Schultz, Et omtumlet bus, pp. 49970.