Touring Copenhagen with Danish Artists

As a city, Copenhagen is not only beautiful but also easy to navigate by bicycle. When I recently visited, I also observed how much water encircles the city.

I was there to learn more about artists who had worked in the 19th century. I wanted to find what they saw and learn what has changed.

Traversing the city of Copenhagen and its environs, I was struck by the places important to artists like Christoffer Wilhelm Eckersberg, who painted his daughters standing at a window in his studio, or Johan Thomas Lundbye, who depicted the castle of Kronborg. These same places remain important to Danish citizens today. The built environment, including the old castles, is part of the culture, as are the vistas and views.

As I followed in the artists’ footsteps, I became increasingly aware of the ties that bind the Danish past to the present.

Beyond the Light: Identity and Place in 19th-Century Danish Art, on view at the Getty Center through August 20, tells a powerful story about shifting borders, national identity, and feelings of belonging and displacement. As I acquainted myself more with Denmark, I walked through the places these Danish artists had depicted in the past and came away seeing a little bit more in their works than I had before.

Here are some highlights.

This is the Royal Danish Academy, now home to a center for art and architecture. When I visited, I stood at the same location that Christoffer Wilhelm Eckersberg had painted in 1852. The watercolor depicts his adult daughters standing at the window in his studio on the first floor. This domestic portrayal of the studio is not surprising, as the artist taught and lived there for nearly 35 years. Eckersberg masterfully constructed the space using linear perspective. He made his scene of everyday life appear like an ideal truth, timeless and permanent. Standing in the same space almost two centuries later, one feels deeply connected to the artistic past.

Frederiksborg Castle, seen from the northeast in 1817 by Johan Christian Dahl, encapsulates the national landscape of Denmark. The massive Baroque palace is perched on three small islets in Castle Lake. Dahl’s view is from a small knoll at the top of a trail in the gardens across the lake. Walking in the artist’s footsteps, I journeyed on this path to capture the sublime view.

Standing on the observation deck of the Round Tower allows for a panoramic view of the city of Copenhagen and a glimpse of the sound that separates Denmark from Sweden. The photo re-creates the scene depicted in Heinrich Gustav Ferdinand Holm’s watercolor drawing of about 1836. Notice the wrought iron lattice railing that has the monogram of King Christian IV, who completed the tower in 1642. Conceived as an observatory, the structure allows for an elevated view over the rooftops. The square tower of the Church of Our Lady (1829) is seen at the left, and the 18th-century spire of the Church of St. Peter is at the right.

During his travels in Denmark during the winter of 1848, Johan Thomas Lundbye made this watercolor of the castle of Kronborg, immortalized as Elsinore in Shakespeare’s Hamlet and one of the most recognizable buildings in Denmark. Constructed during the Renaissance, Kronborg was the coastal fortification used to collect tolls for entry into the Baltic Sea. Framed by trees in both photo and drawing, the beautifully backlit castle looms in the distance.

Beyond the Light: Identity and Place in 19th-Century Danish Art is on view at the Getty Center May 23–August 20, 2023.