The legal battle over the Picasso-Nesjar murals removed by the Norwegian government from the Y Block administrative building in Oslo earlier this week is escalating. The Fishermen hung on the brutalist façade while The Seagull was located in the lobby of the building, which was designed by the Norwegian architect Erling Viksjø in 1969. — The Art Newspaper
Norway's controversial decision to demolish the 1960s Y-block building that was damaged by a car bomb explosion in the July 22, 2011 terrorist attack — and with it, to remove two murals created by Pablo Picasso and Carl Nesjar specifically for this building — has been generating a heated debate and legal steps for many years now.
According to The Art Newspaper, both murals are being removed this week.
2 Comments
Picasso is not sacred. That wall can be improved upon. Let someone who wants to invest remove the art for their own purposes.
The murals are an integral part of the structure and are built in. It's a shame they couldn't have just preserved the building. By itself, it's an OK brutalist building. With the murals it is quite distinctive.
There has been much discussion about monuments here. Preserved, the building would have stood as a monument to a state and people surviving, rising above terrorism, a peaceful one.
The H-building, not to be demolished, also has murals. I'd like to see more of this.
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