Oslo City Hall
The monumental city hall of Oslo ( Norwegian Oslo rådhus ) is an architectural dominant feature in the capital and has great historical and symbolic importance as a representative symbol of Norwegian independence. It is known worldwide through the annual Nobel Peace Prize award ceremony there .
history
Immediately after the union with Sweden was dissolved by the Norwegian Storting by means of a resolution of June 7, 1905, demands were made to celebrate the newly won independence with a corresponding building. In 1914, the then mayor of Oslo , Hieronymus Heyerdahl , took the initiative to raise funds, which proved to be very successful. As a result, there was a first architectural competition , which Arnstein Arneberg and Magnus Poulsson won with a project that was still quite historical. However, financing problems and the First World War (in which Norway maintained its neutrality , but suffered from the submarine war ) delayed the project.
Only the eighth design by the architects, that of 1930, was ultimately implemented. Stylistically, he tried to find a kind of middle line between national romanticism , functionalism and the pathetic classicism of the 1930s. The foundation stone was laid in autumn 1931, and the first offices could be moved into in 1939. However, the final completion of the building was delayed by the Second World War . The official inauguration took place on May 15, 1950 by Mayor Halvdan Eyvind Stokke . As part of the large-scale development plan, a poor district, called Pipervika , was razed and the view of the Oslofjord opened up.
The competition for artistic interior design was announced in 1936. History, art and culture of Norway should be presented here, with “the people” at the center. All materials had to be of Norwegian origin.
However, Norway was drawn into the Second World War by the German raid in April 1940. Occupation , resistance and collaboration are therefore echoed in the fresco decoration of the building, especially in the fresco by Alf Rolfsen on the east wall of the large town hall. But other conflicts also found their symbolic representation here and attempted reconciliation. Karl Högberg created a fresco about “trade and industry” with funds from the Oslo Stock Exchange , Reidar Aulie (after protests by the left) was then allowed to design a kind of counterpart about the labor movement in a very similar style .
The festival gallery was designed by Axel Revold , the banquet hall by Johan Wilhelm Midelfart . The painting Life by Edvard Munch was purchased for the “Munch Room” .
Oslo City Hall thus presents itself as the work of great national ambition, but also as a complex document of the political and artistic tendencies of the first half of the 20th century.
building
The town hall consists of a central building in which the city parliament and the festival rooms are located, and two towers with office space for around 450 city administration employees. The east tower is 66 meters high, the west tower 63 meters. The floor area of the building is 4,560 m 2 , the total usable area around 38,000 m 2 . The central hall has an area of 1,500 m 2 and is 20.8 m high.
In 2000 the carillon was expanded. Today it consists of 49 bronze bells of different sizes, weighing between 4 and 14 kg.
Events
Every year on December 10th, the anniversary of Alfred Nobel's death , the award ceremony for the Nobel Peace Prize takes place in Oslo City Hall .
In addition, around 400 receptions and festive events take place every year. Since 1994, civil weddings have not been held in the town hall, but in the Tinghus.
Guided tours of the town hall take place daily in summer.
literature
- Carl Just (Red.): The Oslo City Hall . Oslo 1973.
- Robert Schediwy: City Pictures. Reflections on change in architecture and urbanism , Vienna 2005. especially p. 161 ff, ISBN 3-8258-7755-8 .
Web links
- Description of the town hall (Norwegian)
Coordinates: 59 ° 54 ′ 42 ″ N , 10 ° 44 ′ 1 ″ E