Odd Nerdrum is a Norwegian figurative painter, born in Sweden, and considered to be one of the greatest living classical figurative painters. His work is held by museums worldwide. Themes and style in Nerdrum's work reference anecdote and narrative. Primary influences by the painters Rembrandt and Caravaggio help place his work in direct conflict with the abstraction and conceptual art considered acceptable in much of Norway. Nerdrum creates six to eight paintings a year. They include still life paintings of small, everyday objects, portraits and self-portraits, and large paintings allegorical and apocalyptic in nature. The figures in Nerdrum's paintings are often dressed as if from another time and place.
Events from the year 1981 in art.
Christian Tybring-Gjedde is a Norwegian politician who represents the Progress Party. He has been a member of the Norwegian parliament since 2005, and was the leader of the Progress Party's Oslo chapter from 2010 to 2014.
Anne Holt is a Norwegian author, lawyer and former Minister of Justice.
Cecilie Broch Knudsen is a Norwegian artist who was rector of the Oslo National Academy of the Arts from August 2007 to August 2015.
David Sandved was a Norwegian architect.
Jan Valentin Sæther was a Norwegian figurative painter, sculptor and gnostic priest. He was professor of figurative painting at the National Academy of the Arts in Oslo between 1996 and 2002.
Rolland Harve Golden was an American visual artist known mainly for his realism, abstract realism and "Borderline-Surrealisterm", a term he used to describe a style of his where the subject is "not entirely impossible, but highly unlikely." He is listed in Marquis Who's Who in America, Marquis Who's Who in American Art and Marquis Who's Who in the World.
Natalie Radina Holland is a Russian-born contemporary artist, formerly based in Norway and now working in England.
Richard T. Scott is an American history painter and writer living and working in the Hudson Valley, New York. His paintings are in the permanent collections of museums in North America and Europe. He was formerly a member of the Artistic Infusion Program, a group of artists and illustrators contracted to design coins and Congressional Medals for the United States Mint.
Kitsch painting is an international movement made up of classical painters, a result of a 24 September 1998 speech and philosophy given by the Norwegian figurative artist, Odd Nerdrum, later clarified in his book On Kitsch with Jan-Ove Tuv and others. The movement incorporates the techniques of the Old Masters with narrative, romanticism, and emotionally charged imagery. The movement defines Kitsch as synonymous with the arts of ancient Rome or the techne of ancient Greece. Kitsch painters embrace kitsch as a positive term not in opposition to "art", but as its own independent superstructure. Kitsch painters assert that Kitsch is not an art movement, but a philosophical movement separate from art. The Kitsch movement has been considered an indirect criticism of the contemporary art world, but according to Nerdrum, this is not the expressed intention.
Kaja Norum is a Norwegian model and figurativist painter. A former student and protégé of painter Odd Nerdrum, Norum is devoted to Nerdrum's philosophy of Kitsch painting, and is a part of The Kitsch Movement spawned by Nerdrum. After the latter relocated to France in 2011, Norum is the primary caretaker of his gallery and his estate.
The Cloud is a 1985 oil painting by the Norwegian artist Odd Nerdrum. It depicts a nude man in a leather helmet, looking out over a landscape with a compact dark cloud in the sky.
Iron Law is a 1984 painting by the Norwegian artist Odd Nerdrum. It depicts two men in a grey and desolate coastal landscape, as the man to the right—wearing a blindfold—is about to strike the man to the left with a metal rod. In the background a third man is running away from the scene.
Dawn is a 1989 painting by the Norwegian artist Odd Nerdrum. It depicts four identical men in a grey rocky landscape. The men are seen from the side as they sit on the ground, with scullcaps and leather wrapped around their shoulders, and face the sky above them with closed eyes and open mouths.
The Savior of Painting is a 1997 painting by the Norwegian artist Odd Nerdrum. It is also known as Self-Portrait as the Prophet of Painting. It depicts Nerdrum in a golden robe, standing barefoot under the evening sky, with a paintbrush in his right hand and a palette in his left.
The Murder of Andreas Baader is a 1978 painting by the Norwegian artist Odd Nerdrum. It depicts the speculative murder of Andreas Baader, one of the leaders of the far-left organisation Red Army Faction, in the Stammheim Prison in 1977.
Liberation is a 1974 painting by the Norwegian artist Odd Nerdrum. It depicts a room with a mattress where a couple have sexual intercourse with the woman on top of the passive man.
Woman Kills Injured Man is a 1994 painting by the Norwegian artist Odd Nerdrum. It depicts a man who is assaulted by a woman armed with a knife.
Resett, also known as Resett.no, was a Norwegian online newspaper, which publisheed news and op-ed content. The website was launched in 2017 with Helge Lurås as editor-in-chief. Resett aimed to "present cases from a different angle than established mass media, and to cover news that other media do not want to cover". The newspaper closed operations in December 2022.
