Wanky Wednesday

I think it's abundantly clear to pretty much everyone that I just don't "get" art. I wish I did, truly, I do, but I just don't.

But free stuff is like crack to me and Thorvaldsen's Museum is free on Wednesdays, so I summoned my inner pretentious hipster and tried to silence my inner art sceptic.

Thorvaldsen was a Danish-born sculptor who spent the vast majority of his life in Rome, chilling with Napoleon and making awesome sculptures(*).

Thorvaldsen's self-portrait

So Thorvaldsen was kind of a big deal, and when he returned to Denmark in 1838, the city had a massive party to celebrate his return. The party was so massive, it is portrayed on a fresco reaching the entire way around his museum.

The people of Copenhagen welcoming Thorvaldsen back.

This was the first sculpture we saw when walked in.
It was breathtaking.
It was absolutely massive, and so intricately detailed.
I wanted to put a photo of its hind quarters up here to show how incredibly detailed it was (right down to some raised veins), but then I realised that there was also an incredibly detailed horse penis visible and decided to give it a miss.
This is a classy establishment, don't you know?

Such incredible detail, from heads to toes. 

Thorvaldsen's museum was constructed from 1839-1848, however Thorvaldsen himself did not live to see the finished building - he died in 1844. It is a unconfirmed story that on the night he died he had dinner with his friend H.C Andersen (name dropping!) where he said "Now I can die whenever it is time because Bindesboll [the architect who was designing Thorvaldsen's museum]  has finished my tomb". He then went to the theatre where he died suddenly from an aneurysm.

Thorvaldsen's grave is in a courtyard in the middle of the museum 

Thorvaldsen was inspired by Greek and Roman mythology, so the vast majority of his works portray characters and scenes from these stories.

Hercules

Thorvaldsen was also a bit of a hoarder. The entire second floor of the gallery is taken up with with Thorvaldsen's own collection of artwork and Greek and Roman artefacts. Considering that the largest artefact he had was a helmet, and the second floor was completely filled gives an idea of how much stuff he managed to accumulate. He also had a massive collection of stone sculpture "parts" taken from other artworks. He copied was inspired by these and replicated them exactly in his own works.

This part of the museum was a little bit eerie because it was just rows upon rows of stone body parts, bits of horses and cupids. 

Example of how a plaster mould is made. 

(*) When I say "making awesome sculptures", what I mean is apparently not making awesome sculptures.

Hidden in the depths of of the museum, near the toilets is a small glass cabinet with some small, unimpressive carvings. Next to that cabinet is a brass information sign. Apparently Thorvaldsen himself did not carve the beautiful, towering sculptures we had spent the last 2 hours admiring. Instead. He did the sketches and small models AND THEN GAVE THESE TO STONE MASONS WHOSE JOB IT WAS TO MAKE THEM BIGGER.

Just for comparison's sake, there is Thorvaldsen's carving next to the sculpture.

It just isn't as good as the big one.
There is nowhere near the same level of detail. 

Not going to lie, I felt a little bit ripped off, and I'm fairly certain the poor stonemasons whose job it was to sculpt Thorvaldsen's sculptures probably felt the same way.

Sneaky museum, sneaky.