Landscape versus Museum: J. C. Dahl and the preservation of norwegian burial mounds

Abstract

Nature preserves while museums destroy, the illustrious landscape painter J. C. Dahl warned the Norwegian public in 1843. This article explores Dahl's logic in passionately advising against the excavation of medieval Norwegian burial mounds and the transfer of their artifacts to newly founded museums. Dahl was distressed that the meaning of the objects would be lost in institutional translation, and instead advocated for the designation of the mounds as the natural and veritable museums of their own contents-thereby turning the landscape itself into an imaginary, large-scale museum. Lending argues that Dahl's skepticism over the role of the museum constitutes an overlooked early contribution to the now-familiar critique of the museum as an instrument of deadening decontextualization.