Kystlandskap i sommerlys
– Kunsten finner sted

Why did so many of Norway's foremost artists and architects seek out the outermost reaches of the Oslofjord? From the late 1800s and through more than a hundred years, Christian Krohg, Eilif Peterssen, Ludvig Karsten, Bernhard Folkestad, Jean Heiberg, Astri Welhaven Heiberg, Lul Krag, Carl von Hanno, Sverre Fehn and Dag Alveng found motifs and inspiration in a distinctive coastal landscape around Sandø, Hvasser, Brøtsø and Tjøme.

Coastal Landscape in Summer Light – Art Takes Place is a richly illustrated anthology in which eleven art historians and curators revisit these places anew and chart an overlooked but essential side of Norwegian modernism — where art literally takes place.

Orfeus Publishing
IFIKK
Haugar Art Museum

©ORFEUS PUBLISHING 2026
Kystlandskap i sommerlys
– Kunsten finner sted
ISBN 978-82-93959-36-6

1st edition 2026

Editors:
Espen Johnsen, Bente Larsen, Øystein Sjåstad

Texts:
Luisa Aubert, Øivind Storm Bjerke, Signe Endresen, Kirsten S. Faye, Espen Johnsen, Bente Larsen, Kathrine Lund, MaryClaire Pappas, Øystein Sjåstad, Øystein Ustvedt, Wenche Volle

Publishing editor:
Inger Schjoldager

English proofreading: Peter Cripps
Graphic design/repro: Halvor Bodin, Tjøme
Paper/endpapers: GardaPat 13 Bianka 135 g/m²
Cover: Munken Lynx Rough 300 g/m²
Typography: ABC Favorit
Printing: Livonia Print SIA, 2026, Latvia

© Copyright to the artworks
BONO – Visual Arts Copyright Society in Norway, Oslo 2026. Dag Alveng – Reidar Aulie – Jean Heiberg – Marianne Heske

Department of Philosophy, Classics, History of Art and Ideas (IFIKK). Faculty of Humanities, University of Oslo.

More documentation photos to follow.

En norsk europeer i København
– Eicind Eckbos liv og virke i København

“Distinguished Merits and Actions”
from the statutes of the Order of the Dannebrog, 1808

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As Denmark’s Ambassador to Norway, I am pleased to extend my congratulations on the publication of A Norwegian European in Copenhagen. The book offers an insight into the extraordinary life and activities of the businessman and patron Eivind Eckbo (1873–1966).

Eivind Eckbo’s longstanding contribution to Danish-Norwegian business and culture was recognised when King Frederik IX appointed him Knight of the First Class of the Order of the Dannebrog in 1959. The grounds were that Eivind Eckbo had promoted mutual understanding and cultural relations between the two countries, Norway and Denmark.

In Norway, Eckbo's Legat—known as one of the country’s most venerable charitable foundations—was established by Alice Mary Higford Eckbo (1876–1960) and Eivind Eckbo in 1923. Each year, Eckbo's Foundation distributes substantial sums in support of arts and culture, medical research, and many other causes.

That Eivind Eckbo built a significant business presence in Denmark is less widely known. There he owned and operated several industrial enterprises, including De Danske Oliemøller og Sæbefabrikker (the Danish Oil Mills and Soap Factories) and the property company Ejendomsaktieselskabet Hermes. As a major shareholder and advocate for Nordisk Film, he also helped to safeguard the Danish company’s rights.

In Copenhagen he founded the Eivind Eckbo Danish-Norwegian Foundation, whose purpose is to support Danish-Norwegian relations and cooperation. A fine example of this was the Foundation’s support for an exhibition collaboration between the Vigeland Museum, the Glyptotek in Copenhagen, and Faaborg Museum in 2025. The exhibition presented works by the great Danish sculptor Kai Nielsen (1882–1924) at the Vigeland Museum.

In 1934, Eivind Eckbo became the owner of Sct. Annæ Passage, the arcade connecting Bredgade and Store Kongensgade in Copenhagen. This distinctive cultural environment is carefully described in the book, in essays by the Danish art historian Dr Lotte Thrane and the Norwegian architectural historian Dr Mathilde Sprovin, and will likely be of interest to anyone with a passion for the architectural history of Copenhagen.

Congratulations on this publication!

Oslo/Copenhagen, Spring 2026

Louise Bang Jespersen
Ambassador of Denmark to Norway

Orfeus Publishing
Eckbos Legat

©ORFEUS PUBLISHING

En norsk europeer i København
– Eivind Eckbos liv og virke i Danmark

ISBN: 978-82-93959-32-8

1st edition 2026

This book has been produced in collaboration with Eivind Eckbos Dansk-Norske Legat

Text:
Dag Blakkisrud
Mathilde Sprovin
Lotte Thrane

Editor:
Birgitte M. Siem

Graphic design/repro: Halvor Bodin
Paper: Arctic Matt 150 g/m²
Endpapers: Munken Lynx 150 g/m²
Cover cloth: Brillianta 4235
Typography: Arizona
Trykk: Livonia Print SIA, 2026, Latvia

More documentation photos to come

Sverre Bjertnæs – Three Paintings in Search of Their Values

The three works that form the presentation by Sverre Bjertnæs at Stockholm’s Market Art Fair are titled, in Norwegian, Den svake krona, Oljefondet, and Arbeidende kapital. When translated this means, respectively, The Weak Krone, The Oil Fund, and Working Capital. Stripped from their original context, I suspect they’re not quite as catchy as the original. However, they still display a very similar tone, a dryness that contrasts with the colors, textures, and materiality of the paintings themselves.

Formally, the paintings are immediately recognizable as Bjertnæs’s current style, his way of combining references to both abstract and figurative modernism with a special focus on a few select predecessors from Norwegian postwar painting. Painted in a selection of rich colors, layered in a way that is both dense and light at the same time, the backgrounds of the works combine a variety of different painterly techniques. There are what appear to be stenciled dots, which are the results of the artist applying bubble wrap to wet paint and then ripping it off. It sometimes reads like a printed halftone, reinforcing a tension between manual and mechanical mark-making.

Erlend Hammer


More info on this project at euklid/rusten
And about Sverre Bjertnæs

2026
eiklid/rusten presents a solo presentation of new work by Sverre Bjertnæs at Market Art Fair 2026, Stockholm. Booth 47, Magasin 9, 23–26 April. Three paintings and three limited edition wool blankets in collaboration with Røros Tweed.

Printed catalogue 42 x 26 cm

© Artworks Sverre Bjertnæs/BONO
© Text Erlend Hammer

Text/Editor: Erlend Hammer
Copy editing: Rachel Walther
Photography: Øystein Thorvaldsen
Graphic design: Halvor Bodin
Printer: TS Trykk, Oslo
Paper: Edixion Offset 300 g/m², Edixion Offset 250 g/m²

Edition 100

This blanket is woven from the motif that emerges after the first layers of paint in Sverre Bjertnæs's painting Arbeidende kapital (Working Capital). The title belongs to a series of works in which Bjertnæs explores monetary policy – how money breeds money, and the questions this raises about value, taxation and distribution. The underlying image has been translated into jacquard weave in high-quality Norwegian lambswool, produced by Røros Tweed. The blanket is released in a limited edition of 80 copies and is signed by the artist.

For sale at Grafikk Oslo

Bjarne Melgaard – Let me be the one

Window foil and two screen prints.

2026
Bjarne Melgaard exhibition at Bergen Contemporary, Norway 260319—260426.

Line drawings (black ink on paper): Bjarne Melgaard
Colour artwork and composition on these two screen prints and the window foil: Halvor Bodin
Screen printing on paper: 10/10, Oslo

Other projects with or about Bjarne Melgaard on this site
View all older projects with Bjarne Melgaard in my archive

Bjarne Melgaard – Glass Candy

“A gaze toward childhood, memories, and formative experiences, letting these form the point of departure for an artistic project that moves in the tension between vulnerability and resistance. The exhibition takes shape around the idea of making a book for children — not as a pedagogical project, but as a structural and emotional framework.”
From the exhibition text


Music functions as a governing parameter in animation and video, where visual processes are activated through technology drawn from VJing and live visuals. Colour generation, pixel displacement, and image distortion arise as direct responses to the dynamics and structure of sound.

The works originate from monochrome line drawings, which in a generative improvisational process with real-time feedback meet the music. The digital video material is archived, and the process results in a selection of still images in colour. These are finally combined with the original line drawings to form the finished motifs.

The music driving the animations consists of, at the time, unreleased material by the Black Metal bands Thorns and Slagmaur. The works carry an inherent relationship to the music’s structure and cultural significance without this being directly readable in visual terms.

The screen prints are square in format, similar in size to vinyl record covers, and made to relate to the oversized pages of a children’s book.
Halvor Bodin

Other projects with or about Bjarne Melgaard on this site
View all older projects with Bjarne Melgaard in my archive

2026
Bjarne Melgaard exhibition at Galleri Kobbel in Kristiansand, Norway 260130—260328.

Line drawings and hand-colouring on screen prints: Bjarne Melgaard
Animation/colour artwork and composition on all the screen prints and the window foil: Halvor Bodin
Screen printing on paper and clothing: 10/10, Oslo
Documentation photos: Galleri Kobbel

Press:
“The most potent work in the exhibition is the 11 x 3 metre window film Glass Candy. It is lush, painterly, and playful, and gives me a genuine art experience this evening. Here Melgaard unfolds his playful line in a large format and demonstrates what a confident colourist he is. This is simply wonderful and works as eye candy here in the winter storm.”
Frida Forsgren, Fædrelandsvennen 260202