Design for a large exhibition showcasing more than 100 paintings juxtaposing Dutch 17th century art with the era known as the Danish Golden Age – the first half of the 19th century – at The Nivaagaard Painting Collection.

The focus of the exhibition is the style known as “genre painting”, which as opposed to historical or religious painting depicts normal people in scenes and situations from everyday life.

Many of the paintings depict people looking through or sitting by a window. For this reason the window itself became a motif in the exhibition design, as holes in the new walls, framing the view and connecting the artworks on either side of the wall.

As the exhibition relies heavily on borrowing masterpieces from international collections, a big obstacle was securing proper safety distance between the works and the museum guests.

We turned this to our advantage and created large skirting elements along all boundary walls with an angled face to display text at a comfortable viewing angle. In the same manner, all new walls were designed with a large foot element for stability and distance, and an angled face for text display.

The many pictures are hung on the walls in a playful manner, to highlight the commonplace and often satirical situations being depicted.

All photos by David Stjernholm.