1950, Willi Midelfart, Growth (Det gror) -- Oslo City Hall
From the Oslo Municipality Art Collection website (www.kunstsamlingen.no):
Around 1930, Midelfart distinguished himself with his sometimes dramatic and socially critical paintings, but landscapes gradually became the most important motif in his production. The interaction between people and nature also characterized his draft Det gror for the competition in 1937–38 to decorate Oslo City Hall.
This also influenced the painting that Midelfart was allowed to realize. The motif seems to be taken from the bathing life at Holmsbu, where he often painted. It mostly tells about the increasing importance of leisure and outdoor life around the middle of the century, while the light and thinly applied paint may be due to impressions from Munch's hall decoration, not least because Munch had also decorated a representative hall with natural scenes populated with partly naked people. The group in the middle of the picture, where children are studying something on the ground, is reminiscent of the children on the beach in one version of the hall decoration The Scientists .
While Midelfart was working on the painting inside the town hall during World War II, the painting was damaged by an explosion at Filipstad in 1943. He therefore had to start over, and thus had the opportunity to better adapt the format to the final design of the background wall. It nevertheless proved demanding to give the not particularly tight composition, based almost entirely on 26 nude studies, the power required by a background motif in a 36-meter-long hall. It was not made easier by the fact that two necessary serving doors interfered with the painting surface. The artist expressed what he thought of them by having one of the picture's toddlers point towards one of the doors while sticking out his tongue!
1950, Willi Midelfart, Growth (Det gror) -- Oslo City Hall
From the Oslo Municipality Art Collection website (www.kunstsamlingen.no):
Around 1930, Midelfart distinguished himself with his sometimes dramatic and socially critical paintings, but landscapes gradually became the most important motif in his production. The interaction between people and nature also characterized his draft Det gror for the competition in 1937–38 to decorate Oslo City Hall.
This also influenced the painting that Midelfart was allowed to realize. The motif seems to be taken from the bathing life at Holmsbu, where he often painted. It mostly tells about the increasing importance of leisure and outdoor life around the middle of the century, while the light and thinly applied paint may be due to impressions from Munch's hall decoration, not least because Munch had also decorated a representative hall with natural scenes populated with partly naked people. The group in the middle of the picture, where children are studying something on the ground, is reminiscent of the children on the beach in one version of the hall decoration The Scientists .
While Midelfart was working on the painting inside the town hall during World War II, the painting was damaged by an explosion at Filipstad in 1943. He therefore had to start over, and thus had the opportunity to better adapt the format to the final design of the background wall. It nevertheless proved demanding to give the not particularly tight composition, based almost entirely on 26 nude studies, the power required by a background motif in a 36-meter-long hall. It was not made easier by the fact that two necessary serving doors interfered with the painting surface. The artist expressed what he thought of them by having one of the picture's toddlers point towards one of the doors while sticking out his tongue!