Art In The Fjords: Dive Into Oslo’s Astrup Fearnley Museum

Astrup Fearnley Museum, Oslo, Norway designed by Renzo Piano. Photograph by Paul Allen/ Andfotography2

“It is vital that art is not locked away. It needs to be shown and experienced. We have to learn from it.” Hans Rasmus Astrup

Founded in 1993 by Norwegian shipping magnate and art collector Hans Rasmus Astrup, the Astrup Fearnley Museum in Oslo holds one of the most comprehensive collections of international contemporary art in Europe. The man behind the museum, an ardent collector of modern art since the 1960s, was keen that the public should enjoy his collection too. Today the collection contains around 1,500 works and continues to grow, thanks to a fund created by Mr Astrup for ongoing purchases.

The Astrup Fearnley Museum of Modern Art in Oslo was designed by Renzo Piano. GETTY

The striking waterside museum, designed by Renzo Piano (architect of the Paris’s Pompidou, The Shard in London, the Whitney Museum of American Art and many more architectural icons), is a must see for both art and architecture lovers on any visit to Oslo. It presents changing exhibitions that draw on the impressive permanent collection as well as commissioned new work by artists from all over the world. The current temporary exhibition, The Deep West Assembly (on until 15 September 2024), premieres American artist Cauleen Smith’s new film commissioned by Astrup Fearnley.

The Deep West Assembly by Cauleen Smith

The Deep West Assembly by Cauleen Smith at Astrup Fearnley Museum, Osl. Photograph by Paul Allen/ Andfotography2

On until 15 September 2024, the solo exhibition of work by multidisciplinary American artist and filmmaker Cauleen Smith is both moving and engaging. She is known for her visionary works that draw on experimental cinema from the 1960s and 1970s, science-fiction films and literature and Afro-diasporic experience and thought.

Cauleen Smith, The Deep West Assembly, Astrup Fearnley Museum, Oslo. Photograph by Christian Oeen

This solo exhibition offers a comprehensive view of Smith’s prolific output and premieres her latest film, The Deep West Assembly (2024), commissioned by Astrup Fearnley Museet. The fascinating film combines music, poetry, improvisation and narration to delve into the concepts of geological time and blackness as camouflaged in image, song and word by Black and Brown creators. Incorporating images of geological formations like lava caves, calderas and salt domes, as well as human-made landforms such as ancient Choctaw burial mounds, the film explores Black cultural practices as kin to Indigenous traditions.The exhibition also includes a new large-scale video installation in the museum’s double-height space, as well as the artist’s textile banners, drawings, and recent sculpture series of large hand-poured candles. Upstairs, Smith has embedded a reading room in the exhibition space with books and records (and a turntable that visitors can use).