Debate, Reader Posts | The art and Lillehammer
Opinions This is a debate post. The post expresses the writer’s attitudes.
– Norwegian artists have always wanted to travel, writes Svein Olav Hoff in his book «Kunsten og Lillehammer». -Out to experience, out to learn and out just to get away from the daily repetitive dont.
And they went to Copenhagen to Paris and to Rome. They went there they knew it was something to pick up, something to use. They did as Norwegians have always done. They sought out its European cultural heritage. Therefore, Hoff’s book is more than just a biographical overview of the so-called «Lillehammer painters»: It lifts a small Norwegian town into a larger context. It gives us the story of artists who understood that even when you paint Norwegian rivers, Norwegian mountains, Norwegian farms, men and women, yes, even when you paint Norwegian snow, you have something to learn in Paris.
It is a unique period in the history of the city and the district Hoff describes. A period of 20-30-40 years that we have heard about, read about. but never fully understood the meaning of. At the same time, we give a feeling that it is something that has been lost, something we have lost. Maybe not as dramatic as the soul of the city, but for those who came to Lillehammer as sent as in the early 1970s, you know yourself better in some of the atmosphere, some of the environment Hoff writes about, and the city you meet . Today.
No this is not a book review, by any means. These are just some thoughts after having a great and good experience. The review makes others and better qualified take care of it – and of course they do …
Gunnar Tore Larsen, Lillehammer