Lieblingsort: Ordrupgaard/ Finn-Juhl-Haus

[Fotos: Ordrupgaard]


Finn Juhl’s unique architect-designed home to open as a museum

The pioneer furniture designer Finn Juhl’s home is to become part of Ordrupgaard. The museum is marking the occasion with an exhibition about the world-famous architect and his house.

The Danish architect Finn Juhl (1912–1989) is regarded as one of the greatest furniture designers of the 20th century. He was a pioneer figure within Danish furniture design and the Danish Modern movement, along with such figures as Hans Wegner, Arne Jacobsen, Poul Kjærholm and Børge Mogensen.

Of all contemporary Danish furniture designers, Finn Juhl made the greatest international impact. He was chosen to furnish one of the large council rooms at the UN building in New York. His furniture was represented at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. Finn Juhl thus became a kind of ambassador or producer for Danish Modern outside Denmark. Today, both American and Japanese collectors queue up to buy his unique furniture whenever it comes up for auction.

Synergy with Zaha Hadid
Finn Juhl’ private home was in Kratvænget in Charlottenlund adjoining Ordrupgaard’s park, in a house he himself had designed and built as a young architect in 1942. The house is a unique example of Danish modernism as regards architecture, furniture design and visual art. Finn Juhl designed all the furniture for the house, which looks almost exactly as it did when he died in 1989. Thanks to a private donation, the unique architect’s home will in future be part of the Ordrupgaard museum complex. The house will be opened to the public, with direct access from Ordrupgaard’s park, on 4 April 2008, when it will form a fascinating counterpart to the other museum buildings: the old stately home built between 1916 and 1918 by the architect Gotfred Tvede and the Zaha Hadid extension of 2005.

The artist among furniture designers
Ordrupgaard is marking the opening of Finn Juhl’s house with a presentation exhibition about the furniture designer and his house. The exhibition will present highlights from his architecture, furniture design and interior design, based on his own home in Kratvænget. It will focus on the artistic, sculptural side of his work as a furniture designer – a hitherto relatively undocumented aspect of his work. In many ways, Finn Juhl was the artist among the Danish furniture designers of his age, and his furniture has a distinctively organic, sculptural idiom that in its expression is far-removed from the rest of the furniture design of the time.

The exhibition about Finn Juhl’s house will last from 4 April to 31 August. During that period, both the exhibition and the house can be seen during museum opening hours. [Pressetext]

http://www.ordrupgaard.dk/topics/frontpage.aspx