The Gift
Press release Bornholm Art Museum, 2014
The sculptor Jørgen Haugen Sørensen donates several hundred works to Bornholm's Art Museum.
In 1838, the frigate Rota sailed home Bertel Thorvaldsen's works from Italy to the future museum on Slotsholmen. Jørgen Haugen Sørensen will probably refuse military intervention, but over the past week, one truckload after another has been handed over to Bornholm's Art Museum.
The many transport boxes contain models and sculptures by the sculptor Jørgen Haugen Sørensen, who in connection with his 80th birthday, has decided to donate a large part of his work to Bornholm's Art Museum.
Jørgen Haugen Sørensen has a lifelong connection to Bornholm, where his mother was born. Throughout his life, he returned to the island, both as a child with his grandparents and later to work sculpturally, as in the early 1960s, when he at Rabækkeværket developed his pipe sculptures from the raw extruded clay pipes. Jørgen Haugen Sørensen also has a great veneration for Bornholms Kunstmuseum, which in its collection already has a number of works by the artist, from the early bronze dogs he showed at the Venice Biennale in 1958 to the most recent such as. "The Brothers Sorrow and Guilt".
Jørgen Haugen Sørensen celebrated his 80th birthday at Bornholm Art Museum.
In connection with the large donation, he said:
As an artist, you are of course always a bit flattered when there is interest in your work and Bornholms Kunstmuseum has for the past 20 years followed my work closely and also shown several large exhibitions of my works. Now the most important part of my work is gathered in a place where you can get an overview and where it is secured for the future. I only have good memories from Bornholm and I am glad that this is exactly where my works can be preserved. ”
Museum director Lars Kærulf Møller enthusiastically talks about the great gift.
“I consider Jørgen Haugen Sørensen one of the most significant sculptors of the 20th century, and that he just chooses us to receive the distinguished donation, I see as a fantastic gift to Bornholm and to the museum. Many have asked: Where will you make the hundreds of sculptures?, and of course there are some logistical challenges right now, but we have already incorporated a special room in the upcoming expansion, so that in the future we can present the collection in the finest way . ”
The donation was presented at a reception at Bornholm Art Museum on Saturday 4 October
