The Niels Larsen Stevns Centre

The Niels Larsen Stevns Centre

Niels Larsen Stevns (1864-1941) is one of Danish art’s most distinctive painters - and one of the core artists at Vendsyssel Museum of Art. The Niels Larsen Stevns Centre is an extension to the museum, which is dedicated to disseminating the latest research on Niels Larsen Stevns. It features changing exhibitions with works from the museum’s collection and deposited works from other museums.

Niels Larsen Stevns was firm in his Christian faith but lived and worked in a time and environment where religion played a lesser role than in the past and where the modernist upheaval characterized the discussions of the time. He was aware of this contradiction but uncompromising in his choices, and his work therefore reflects his increasingly far-reaching recognition of the divine. This profoundly personal development places Niels Larsen Stevns as a unique artist in 20th century Danish art.

With his modernist idiom and bold vision of colour, Niels Larsen Stevns renewed traditional genres such as landscape painting, historical and biblical images. His vivid and luminous landscapes, dramatic history paintings, and modern biblical depictions with universal human appeal have inspired later generations of artists.