18.11.2008

Thorvaldsen’s Letters Published on the Internet

Homage poems, love letters and large art contracts – Thorvaldsen’s letter collection is a priceless source of knowledge about both daily life and art in the world famous sculptor’s life. From November 19th 2008 you can read the letters on the internet.

Thorvaldsen’s wax seal.

Thorvaldsens Museum in Copenhagen contains a huge collection of some 4500 documents and letters from, to and about the world-famous sculptor. In these letters, we meet Thorvaldsen’s family, Danish and foreign friends, outstanding European cultural figures, princes, aristocrats, artists, art-lovers and clients who were in touch with the best known Danish artist in the first half of the 19th century.

The Digital Letter Archives Open

For many years, Thorvaldsens Museum has been moved by a great desire to publish the letters, but special resources were needed to cope with the vast amount of material hidden away in cupboards of archives in the museum. So it is only with the potential offered by modern digital techniques that the archives can be published to their best advantage. Now the letters will be freely available on the Internet for anyone interested, from Thule to Timbuktu. The digital version of the letter archives will open on Thorvaldsen’s 238th birthday, 19.11.2008, and its address will be: http:brevarkivet.thorvaldsensmuseum.dk/en

The Main Source of Our Knowledge of Thorvaldsen

The Thorvaldsen Letter Archives are the primary source of our knowledge of Thorvaldsen’s life and work. Here, anyone interested in Thorvaldsen can read everything from his correspondence with his fiancée to his diary entries, letters he exchanged with fellow artists, business letters and poems and speeches in honour of the great sculptor.

The documents not only extend our knowledge of Thorvaldsen’s works, but they also give an invaluable insight into the artistic, social, linguistic and political conditions of the time. For national and international Thorvaldsen scholars the archives will be a mine of materials which for many years to come will be able to generate materials for articles, books, exhibitions and much more.

The Discovery of the Letters

Most of the letters were found after Thorvaldsen’s death in 1844, stored in a dark cellar under the sculptor’s apartment in Rome. The letters were stuffed down into some large barrels that Thorvaldsen had filled up with “bricks, glass, lumps of clay and the like”. He was known for reusing the paper on which letters had been written for rough sketches, notes or drafts for new letters, and when the piles of papers had grown too big, they were apparently consigned to the cellar.

Newly-Developed, Internet-Based Work of Reference

Now the letters are being published in their original languages, Danish, German, Italian, French etc. in a user-friendly work of reference. At the same time they are being provided with explanatory commentaries, illustrations, registers, search tools, reference articles etc. Publication will take place on a continuous basis until 2011.

Unique Virtual World

The Internet publication of the letters and the associated materials are part of the Virtual Thorvaldsen Museum, which has made the museum into a front-runner in the digitalisation of the cultural treasures housed in Danish museums. This is an initiative that was awarded the Bikube Foundation prize for museums in the spring of 2008.

The project is supported by the Velux Foundation and has been developed in collaboration with the Oncotype design group.

Visit The Thorvaldsen Letter Archives.