Gustav Vigeland was born in Mandal on 11 April 1869. He is best known as the creator of Vigeland Park in Oslo. The sculpture park took up most of Vigeland’s late artistic career.

In the beginning Vigeland made his mark with his portraits and monuments. His breakthrough came with the Abel Monument in 1908. In 1911 the monuments commemorating Rikard Nordraak and Camilla Collett confirmed his position as Norway’s most prominent sculptor. Vigeland won recognition in the European art world as well, and was considered by his contemporaries as one of the modernists.

The Vigeland museum houses a nearly complete collection of Vigeland’s art. He lived and worked here during the last 20 years of his life. The building is one of Norway’s foremost examples of neoclassical architecture and is the result of a unique contract Vigeland signed with the municipality of Oslo. In exchange for a studio that would function as a future museum for his oeuvre, he would donate all of his art to the municipality. Gustav Vigeland died on 12 March 1943. The museum was officially opened on 4 June 1950.

Gustav Vigeland, Hagar and Ismael, 1889. Plaster.

This plaster original of Hagar and Ismael was modeled in the studio of Brynjulf Bergslien and was Gustav Vigeland’s debut work at the National Art Exhibition, The Autumn Exhibition, in the fall of 1889. The motif is taken from the Book of Genesis and depicts the biblical scene in which the slave woman Hagar and her son Ismael are banished to the desert.

Vigeland’s inspiration from the Danish neoclassicist Bertel Thorvaldsen is clearly expressed in the form language of the work.

Gustav Vigeland, Doomsday, 1894. Plaster.

In October 1894, Gustav Vigeland held his first solo exhibition, which took place at the Christiania Art Association. The exhibition consisted of 51 works and was the largest presentation of a sculptor in Norway at the time. Among the works was the relief Doomsday, which depicts the biblical end times. God is positioned in the upper half of the relief, while the sinners are shown descending into hell. The saved, many of whom are children, ascend toward heaven in the upper part of the composition.

When Vigeland was working on the idea for The Monolith around 1920, he referred to both Resurrection and Hell.

Gustav Vigeland, Rizpah mourns her sons, 1894. Plaster.

The relief depicts the biblical story of Rizpah from the Second Book of Samuel, where she mourns her seven sons, executed by order of King David. In the work, the hanged men are divided into two sections, while Rizpah sits in the lower right corner, draped in garments, determined to guard the bodies from birds and predators.

Vigeland modeled an earlier version of the motif in 1892, but this 1894 edition was displayed at his second solo exhibition in Kristiania in 1899. During the 1890s, Vigeland was preoccupied with dramatic themes, and his works often centered on human suffering, grief, and despair.

Gustav Vigeland, Resurrection, 1900. Plaster.

This relief depicts a multitude of people in a powerful, upward movement. The work explores the transition from death to life and can be seen in connection with Vigeland’s reliefs Doomsday and Hell.

In his early works, Vigeland was preoccupied with struggle, suffering, and death, often drawing inspiration from the Bible or Greek mythology. Resurrection was part of a plan for four large reliefs to be displayed in a single hall. Around 1920, when developing the idea for The Monolith, he referenced both this work and Hell.