How can a 200-year-old painting say something about today’s environmental challenges?

This is one of the themes explored by research fellow Trine Nordkvelle. The painter Thomas Fearnley is the focus of the second research fellowship funded by the Fredriksen Family Art Company (FFAC).

‘The Grindelwald Glacier, from 1838, is a highlight in landscape painting by Norwegian artists’, says research fellow Trine Nordkvelle.

Thomas Fearnley’s magnificent depiction of the Swiss alpine landscape is included in the National Museum’s permanent exhibition. But the subject itself, Grindelwald Glacier, barely exists today. 200 years ago the glacier was massive and stretched its arms all the way down to the village of Grindelwald. Now it has melted almost entirely.

‘The aim of my PhD project is to see Fearnley’s painting of Grindelwald Glacier from an eco-critical perspective. I will use Fearnley’s work as a witness to the Little Ice Age, in dialogue with the discourse on climate challenges in the period in which we now live’, says Trine Nordkvelle.

Climate awareness
‘The Little Ice Age’ is a term used to refer to the climate from about the 1500s to the 1800s. During this period, glaciers grew considerably and the climate was noticeably cooler than in the Middle Ages.

In 1824 the Danish-Norwegian geologist Jens Esmark launched the idea of ice ages and resultant changes in climate. This idea was surely known to Fearnley.

‘Fearnley as a witness of time is interesting. He painted at the very end of the Little Ice Age, just before the transition to modern times, and he was a travelling painter who spent lots of time outdoors. What do his pictures say about how people perceived nature in the 1800s? And how does he convey ‘wildness’ and the sublime? It will be exciting to delve into these questions’, says Trine Nordkvelle.

An early acquisition
The origin of today’s National Museum can be traced back to 1836, when Norway’s parliament allocated 3,000 spesidalers annually for the purchase of ‘all types of art’. Three years later, in 1839, The Grindelwald Glacier was bought, as work number 38 for the national collection. It was one of the first by a Norwegian artist.

‘It’s intriguing to see how a painting acquired almost 200 years ago can contribute to research and new knowledge today. One intention undergirding the National Museum’s doctoral collaboration with the Fredriksen Family Art Company is to show the relevance of our collection in the way done by this PhD project’, says Ingrid Røynesdal, director of the National Museum.

Strengthening research at the museum
The National Museum and the Faculty of Humanities at the University of Oslo have a collaboration agreement through the FFAC for externally funded PhD fellowships. Relevant research projects shall be within fields represented at the National Museum, examples being art history, conservation, education and museum studies.

‘The PhD scholarships reflect initiatives recommended by the Ministry of Culture with regard to research in museums, and they contribute to strengthening the institutions’ research environments at the same time as further developing the contact with academia’, says Thierry Ford, head of research and development at the National Museum.

About Thomas Fearnley:
Thomas Fearnley died at the early age of 39 but left behind a rich legacy in art history. His large paintings such as The Labro Falls and The Grindelwald Glacier bring us closer to nature as he experienced it.

Thomas Fearnley was born in Halden. At five he was sent to Christiania to live with his aunt and uncle. He later began studying at the Norwegian Military Academy, one of very few places in the country that offered instruction in drawing.

Opportunities in Norway at that time were too limited for an ambitious aspiring artist, so Fearnley pursued his art studies at the Art Academy in Copenhagen. He later moved to Stockholm, where he received several prestigious commissions from the royal family.

At a study tour to western Norway, he met fellow Norwegian painter J. C. Dahl, who by then had become a professor in Dresden. Fearnley drew great inspiration from his encounter with Dahl and the trips they took together in the area.

Fearnley had a wide circle of colleagues, friends and supporters in the international art community. In the course of his life, he travelled constantly, and was for this reason called “the European” of the Norwegian art world.

About the research fellow
Trine Nordkvelle (b. 1985) has a master’s degree in art history and has been working with the collection of the National Museum of Norway since 2010. Nordkvelle has catalogued the museum’s prints and drawings, with an emphasis on older art. Her fascination with Thomas Fearnley began in 2012 when she examined 834 of the artist’s drawings.

PhD collaboration
• The National Museum has agreed on a doctorate-level collaboration with the Faculty of Humanities at the University of Oslo, involving four PhD fellows.
• The aim of the agreement is to strengthen the institutions’ research environments and to further develop scholarly contacts between these knowledge communities.
• The scholarship recipients will follow the faculty’s PhD programme.
• The first scholarship officially began in January 2024. Subsequent scholarships will be announced in 2026, and 2027.
• The research grants are financed through the museum’s collaboration agreement with the Fredriksen Family Art Company (FFAC).
• The National Museum is responsible for announcements relating to the PhD scholarships and the awarding of the research scholarships.