Today we did three, almost three and a half "things" and exposed 152 images. But it's getting late and we are somewhat footsore so we will just post the first "thing" now and try to catch up tomorrow.
Thorvaldsen Museum
Museum sign; David in the distance.
Bertel Thorvaldsen (1770-1844) was a Danish sculptor who had a 40-year career of international renoun working mostly in Rome. Returning to Denmark as a national hero in 1838, he cut a deal with the king and government: he would donate all his works to the state if the state would build a museum and make it open to the public (not a common thing at the time).
This was the museum we visited first today, and had a lot of fun taking pictures of the works.
The Danish Navy's biggest warship made multiple trips to collect a large number of massive works, as well as the contents of Thorvaldsen's large workshop and his personal collection of antiquities.
The museum walls are decorated with scenes of moving the works.
Thorvaldsen had customers all over Europe and did heroic portraits of important people of the time. This one is of Jozef Poniatowski, a Polish nobleman and military leader.
Marian in the background for scale.
The Danish Navy's biggest ship wasn't all that big and the large works had to be cut into sections to fit. The seams are visible if you look closely.
They were sectioned about every 1-meter, then pasted back together.
The museum building features long corridors through many small galleries.
The corridor isn't really wavy — each gallery has a different floor pattern.
The ceiling of each little gallery was painted with imitation classical decoration styled after that of Pompeii.
Upstairs is Thorvaldsen's collections: display case after case of ancient coins, signet rings, Greek and Minoan (?) pottery, dozens of paintings. The value of the collection might well rival the value of the man's own works downstairs.
Anyway here are a few of the pieces we thought were especially nice. Remember, you can click for a higher-resolution version.
Hebe being very careful with a cup of ambrosia.
Eros getting underfoot at a meeting of the Three Graces.
Princess Caroline (of Denmark?), apparently not a great beauty but Thorvaldsen (and the nice light today) made her look good.
Hermes feeds Zeus's eagle.
In a small frieze, Eros complains to his mother Venus about being stung by a bee.
And the dude himself, sculpted by a student from a model he left.
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