Date: 13.12.2018
In this seminar WONA research group member Monica Grini presented her forthcoming book project Samisk kunst i norsk kunsthistorie (Sámi Art in Norwegian Art History) based on her PhD Thesis Samisk kunst i norsk kunsthistorie: historiografiske riss (Sámi Art in Norwegian Art History: A Historiographical Study).
In 1940, the art historian Harry Fett described what he called the “the art of the Sámi” as “a chapter of its own in the art myth of humanity”. He related this art to “that of a larger group, namely the art of the peoples living in Siberia; North-America and Greenland’s great plains up toward the Arctic Ocean”. He considered the “particular and vital art of the Finnmark Plateau” an important part of the national art history. In other contexts, however, most of the objects that were categorized as Norwegian art were not placed in the same transnational arctic relations, but were instead perceived as part of European art history and thus oriented southwards. How is the story of Sámi art related to the story of Norwegian art? This study looks at the representation of Sámi art within the larger structures of the history of the discipline in Norway, and by doing so it also tries to shed light on discourses and schemas that dominate the discipline, both today and in a historical perspective.