Viewing The new National Museum of Art, Architecture and Design

Originally scheduled to open in 2020, Norway’s new National Museum of Art, Architecture and Design will now open on 11 June 2022. The largest museum in the Nordic region brings together the collections of three of Norway’s most important art institutions: the former Museum of Decorative Arts and Design, which closed in 2016; the Museum of Contemporary Art, which closed in 2017; and the National Gallery, which closed in 2019.

Designed by German architects Kleihues + Schuwerk, the new National Museum will display more than 5000 artworks spanning millennia and media. Among the star exhibits are Edvard Munch’s The Scream (1893) and a self-portrait by Vincent van Gogh from 1889, which was recently confirmed as genuine after 50 years of uncertainty. Elsewhere, you’ll find everything from prints and drawings, including the largest collection of drawings outside of Dresden by the German romantic painter Caspar David Friedrich, to textiles, Chinese Imperial porcelain and Swiss landscape paintings.

The vast 54,600-square-metre building features extensive exhibition galleries, cafes, a shop and the largest art library in Norway. The architectural showstopper, however, is the Light Hall, an illuminated exhibition space at the heart of the building with marble glass walls. It will host a rich programme of temporary exhibitions, the first of which will be a survey of contemporary Norwegian art. Never has there been a better reason to visit the Norwegian. Capital.