| Til Kunst- og kulturpolitikk |
What struggle? Hvilken kamp?
Foredrag Bergen 16. august 2014. Seminar “Art in struggle” 14-16. august 2014 på KODE i Bergen. Noen avsnitt på norsk ble ikke oversatt til engelsk.
A critical examination of the story about the part the field of art played in the cultural resistance during the art polical führer-regime 1940-1945.[1]
First a remark on the term ”art political regime”.[2] By art political regime, or art political regime of competence, I refer to the type of representation from the field of art that the government chooses to function as the intermediate body between state and art. The general term for this intermediate body is a council, and its major function is to establish an arm’s length distance between art and politics. The traditional type of intermediate body is the academy – an elite of self-recruited closed body of artists whose way of functioning is regulated by the government, who grants it artistic autonomy. I call this an art political academy regime, or only academy regime. Norway had an academy regime both before and after the German occupation.
During the Nazi-regime under the German occupation, this intermediate body came under the führer principle, where all authority, also the aesthetic, came from above. This had the consequence that art came under political control, and that the council was given authority to control and censor art along political lines that came from the political leadership. I call this an art political führer regime, or only führer regime.
“Norwegian art is basically sound to the core”
«It was also spoken about entartet art about names like Ekeland, Strømme and Jynge. As regards the two last I could admit that they in a period after a German exhibition in Oslo had been influenced by the Holsteinian Nolde. But that this must be considered as part of the development and ripening of an artist. And in addition I put forth that in Norwegian art could be traced only weak reminiscences of the large fluctuations and partly excesses that took place in the larger countries of culture. Norwegian art is basically sound to the core.” [3]
I found this text in the archives of the Nazi-led Ministry of culture and propaganda (folkeopplysning), during my work on a book about the courts of honour in the artist organizations after the occupation in May 1945. These extralegal courts were set up to judge member artists that in some way or other had failed the national cause during the führer regime. The one who wrote this on January 11th 1941 to the Ministry was Ulrik Hendriksen, at that time President of the Board of visual artists of Norway – BKS, which was dissolved by the end of the month. When BKS was reconstituted on May11th 1945, Hendriksen was still President of BKS, and the leader of its court of honour. He was also vice-president in the court of appeal for all artists’ organizations.
He had presented himself to the nazi authorities in this way: “The undersigned president of BKS is 49 years old and of pure arian descent and with a German mother. I am not and has not been member of any secret association or any political party. … As president of BKS I can express that the board is livingly interested in any new arrangement that might increase the responsibility of the governing powers for the wellbeing of art, and that might benefit Norwegian art and culture, and I can only regret that BKS so far has not been given the opportunity to give its contribution.”
This correspondence was not found in the archives of BKS, nor in the private archive of Hendriksen that was found in a safe in the offices of the Artists’ Relief Fund (Bildende kunstneres Hjelpefond), whose first director he became in 1948.
The correspondance raises some interesting questions in our context.
1 What power had BKS in the prewar field of art – what role had it in the art political regime?
2 What role had it in making Norwegian art “sound to the core”?
3 What “unsound” art was not accepted by BKS? Was it art that would be termed “entartet” (ukunst) in other circumstances?
4 Were the preferences for art closer between BKS and the führer regime than we like to think?
5 Why was BKS the only artist organization that was dissolved during the occupation?
6 What significance had the prewar opposition against BKS for the führer
regime? Can the division during the occupation be reduced to divisions in directions in art before the occupation?
7 Can one talk about an “art in battle” during the occupation, and in what forms did confrontations take place?
8 How did BKS and its court of honour deal with artists that had collaborated with or in other ways had accepted the legitimity of the art political führer regime, and what importance did differences in art play?
The academy regime – BKS
Right up to 1974, starting in 1888, the field of art stood in a close relationship to the government, with BKS in the traditional role of a royal or state academy, acting within rules set by the ministry of education.[4] BKS administered a system of voting rights, given to artists that had passed the BKS-elected jury of an annual salon at least five times, or had been purchased to the National Gallery by committees that had a majority of BKS-appointed members. The museum board had a BKS-appointed majority as well. BKS either decided or nominated on the distribution of all public and private scholarships, grants and life time income for artists. Up to 1969 it acted as the board for the Art Academy, and appointed its professors, several of whom were members of BKS. It was the consultative body for the government in all art and art policy affairs, inclusive the election of artists for representative exhibitions abroad. There were no annual meetings or annual reports, no forum for oppositional work, no membership except for the Board. In 1930 it got the Kunstnernes Hus, the largest exhibition space in Norway, and set up its headquarter there. BKS controlled the whole field of art, and was in fact a semi-governmental and undemocratic body, like an oldfashioned academy of art
However, one kind of democracy reigned in BKS: elections were held by ballot – written votes were sent to BKS, in a system that gave some proportional representation. That means that minorities would be represented.
With its semi-governmental status BKS became vulnerable in an autoritarian art political führer regime.
Attitudes to avant garde art
The leading art critic Jappe Nilsen wrote about the German group “Der Sturm” that exhibited in Oslo in 1923, that if this tendency becomes usual, “all artjews in the world will throw themselves after it”. The president of the jury for the annual salong “Høstutstillingen” 1937 said that they had tried to keep clean lines and that “we have kept the surrealists away.” The director of the National gallery said about Rolf Nesch in 1938 that it had nothing to do with art. Nesch was an experimenting graphic artist, in the expressionist tradition.
In 1938 BKS demanded that all foreign dealers of art should not be allowed travel to Norway before BKS had given its opinion. [5] In 1939 BKS suggested for the ministry that “all foreign art, that is intended to be exhibited and sold should pass by Oslo and be shown to BKS for its approvement”. Control, approaching censorship, was part of the logic of the academy regime.
BKS favoured main stream and strongly French-oriented post-impressionist art (Matisse, Derain), and created three fronts: 1 against avant-garde and abstract art, 2 against traditional art, and 3 against commercial art. The avant-garde, with cubism, surrealism, dadaism, futurism, suprematism, German fashioned expressionism etc, was not accepted, all factions were against commercial art, and the only opposition was among the traditionalist artists. It was especially this traditionalist opposition, with little influence within BKS, that recruited the limited number of artists that became members of Nasjonal Samling – NS, the nazi-party, that took positions in the führer regime that took the place of BKS, and that accepted the legitimacy of that regime.
BKS was dissolved January 31. 1941. Its semi governmental status made it vulnarable for politial interference. No other artists’ organizations were dissolved, the functioned during the whole occupation. Therefore, artists that had formal positions or contacts with the art political führer regime could be considered traitors to their own trade union. BKS, on the other side, was spared a critical light on its own activities during the occupation. It was probably because of this the post war conflict was especially tense and fiendish in the field of art.
Bildende Kunstneres Styre ble oppløst 31. januar 1941. Det er usikkert om initiativet kom fra Det midlertidige konsultative råd eller fra departementet, siden det i arkiver etter det ikke er tegn på at det behandlet spørsmålet. Både Onsager og Lerdal har sikkert ønsket det. I alle fall overtok det BKS’ funksjoner som kunstnerisk sakkyndig rådgiver og stipendiekomité for departementet. Ingen andre kunstnergrupper fikk sin nasjonale organisasjon oppløst. De billedkunstnere som ble sittende i Det midlertidige konsultative råd kunne lett bli betraktet som forrædere for sin egen fagorganisasjon. BKS, det vil si styret selv, slapp på den andre siden et kritisk lys på seg selv for sin virksomhet under okkupasjonen, slik andre kunstnerorganisasjoner fikk, som ikke ble oppløst.
The führer regime and Søren Onsager
The painter Søren Onsager became the leading and almost only ideologue of the führer regime, and got into positions that he falsly believed would give him power to realize some of his art political ideas. In 1942 he protested against the publication of a revised version of a history of Norwegian art, especially the period after 1930 (he was himself mentioned there). He wrote to the ministry: ”I find that the book, because of Østbys supplement, should be confiscated, because the author by his writing and choice of illustrations supports entarted art. Work against this art, so foreign and so destructive its tendency for our art, is on our program. We want to reestablish our art on a national foundation, and will distance us from all degenerate art.”[6]
In like so many other instances, Onsager did not succeed in his initiative, the ministry would not intervene. Book censorship was widely used in the field of litterature.
In this statement we find the essence of the führer regime – prohibition of art that did not serve the taste of the party. ”Cultural bolshevism”, and ”jewish entartet art” were expressions that could be used, the major enemies being communism and the jews, the first seen as a conspiracy of the second.
Onsager became director of the National Gallery and professor at the State Art Academy. He tried in vain to build them out.
The cultural council
All prerogatives of BKS was given to the so called “temporary consultative council”, manned with NS-artists, collaborators and for a shorter period also some idealists who thought they served the interests of art, and could serve as a counterweight to the NS-artists and to a nazification of the art policy. In 1942 a permanent cultural council was established, with Onsager representing painting and Wilhelm Rasmussen sculpture. Rasmussen was an old time NS member, but without the NS cultural and ultra nationalist ideology of Onsager. Rasmussen was, contrary to Onsager a wellestablished and respected artist, who had been commissioned by the parliament to raise a large nationalistic monument in front of it, celebrating the constitution of 1814. After the occupation, the commission was withdrawn when the 20 m high column was more than half finished.[7]
A Law on painting was given in october 1942, one of Onsagers few successes. Its first paragraph made it compulsory to have written permission from the Ministry to trade in or organize exhibitions of works of art, but not in own atelier or home. Each exhibition needed a permit. The second paragraph introduced a public fee of NOK 10 on each work of art offered for sale at auctions. The money should be use for the benefit of artists and their heirs. The law had three aims: one was to stop sale of nonprofessional art, the other was to control what art that was exhibited and sold, and the third to help artists. Two of the three aims had also been the aims of BKS. The ministry would not accept Onsagers proposal in making expressed sympathy with the führer regime a condition for a permit.
Onsager said the law was mainly intended to control quality, and so it also functioned, but it was also used for censorship. An example: a permit was given to an art dealer under these conditions: only good art, not entartet art, and accept of control from the Ministry.
The auction fee was a success. The money went to a fund, that in its entirety was handed over to BKS after the occupation. The Onsager model for introducing a fee on transactions on the art market was reintroduced in 1948, then only with the aim to support elderly artists.
Art in struggle?
During the whole occupation there were no instances of open conflict between the führer regime and any opposition in the field of art. No visual artists were arrested or fled to Sweden (as far as I know). There were no incidencies of threat or use of force. Other cultural fields, literature, theatre, music had serious conflicts with the führer regime, being forced into a collaboration they opposed.
For the field of art, it will be a gross overstatement to say that it was taking part in a battle. Artists experienced a record art market, they did not suffer economically.
The most prominent case of conflict was the exhibition “Kunst og ukunst” that we heard Anita Kongssund talk about. It was said afterword among “national artists” that it was shameful for artists not to be placed in the room for “entartet” art. However, it is not known of any open public reactions against that exhibition from artists represented in that room. The exhibition was also shown in Trondheim and Bergen. The audience liked the exhibitions, and most were obviously on the traditionalist side, as a broad audience always will be.
What kinds of resistance was possible in the field of art? Since BKS was dissolved, no organized oppositional activity was possible – the führer regime had no counterpart in the field of art as it had for instance in literature, music and theatre. The resistance took primarily the form of paroles – orders for conduct published through illegal papers or from radio London. In the art field, such paroles were emitted only from the autumn of 1943. No representatives of art took part in the bodies that were formed in the cultural fields to cooperate with the resistance movement. It is not known if these parole was initiated from within the field of art.
In the absence of paroles, artists already in 1941, and with full effect from 1942, refrained from applying for grants and scholarships controlled by the führer regime. Such applications were understood as an accept of that regime, and termed un-national by the post-war courts of honour. Economically this had few consequences, since artists sold much better during the occupation, than both before and after. From autumn 1943 paroles told artists not to exhibit separately or in representative group exhibitions, a parole whose effect was mostly limited to Oslo. Sales exhibitions were OK.
I should also mention the establishment of an illegal academy as part of a resistance. But both Onsager and Rasmussen had art students during the occupation.
In Trondheim “many artists sold directly from their ateliers everything they were willing to deliver. They did not need to exhibit, and had difficulties in building up a representative exhibition” – a quotation from their 100 years anniversary publication in 1945, published in 1955.[8]
There was a tendency to boycott NS-artists from the exhibition spaces, as was the case in Oslo Art Association. But not in Trondheim Art Assosiation where its director, the artist Roar Matheson Bye – who painted in the tradition of Neue Sachlichkeit – was member of NS. He obviously favoured artists within the führer regime.
Postwar sanctions and courts of honour
By 1940 295 artists had voting rights in BKS. There were three types of sanctions applied by the BKS court of honour against artists within the BKS sphere: 1 19 BKS members had been members of NS. They immediately lost their voting rights for an unlimited time, without being heard by the court and without rights to appeal. Their cases went to the criminal court, with a normal procedure of law enforcement, among others giving them a right to defence. 2 Against another 16 artists were raised individual accusations, mostly because they had applied for scholarship controlled by the führer regime, exhibited at occasions controlled by or taken commissions from that regime, or in other ways accepted the authorities of the führer regime. Only a couple of them applied to the court of appeal.
One question that can be raised is this: What divided the Norwegian artist most after the end of occupation? Was it the old boarders between tendencies in art? Or was it loyalty towards BKS and/or the «cultural front»?
Of the 40 artists that were judged or considered judged in the court of honor, only one had been represented among the entarted artists in the National Gallery in 1942. That was Rudolph Thygesen, who had been excluded because of his short membership in the preliminary consultative council up to May 1941. His exclusion was later withdrawn by the court of appeal. We can say that the führer regime did not attract artists that belonged to the modernist faction within the academy regime, but many – but by no means the majority – in the traditionalist faction.
About half of the 40 artists treated in the court of honour are represented in the National Gallery. A large part of the them, about 2/3, can be classified as traditional or non-modernist. There is some substance in the claim that the BKS regime had favoured the modernists and neglected the traditionalists, a tendency that will prevail in every autonomous art world.
The court of honour never referred to what kind of art that was made by the artists whose actions it judged. That was also the case in all the other courts of honour, with one or two eceptions. The concept of entartet art was not met by a counterconcept of any sort. The dishonourable was not connected to the kind of art you made.
The dishonourable was not to make money on the conditions that prevailed during the occupation.
The dishonourable was to exploit the economic and symbolic resources in the art political führer regime, and therefore to accept another power structure than the academy regime of BKS. Treason against the academy regime of BKS was considered un-national, a treason of the national cause.
The more famous the artist, the more dishonourable was it to respect the führer regime.
The NS members among the artists got a threefold punishment. First, in the legal courts, since cases were raised against all NS members, irrespective of their involvement in the party. Second, in the courts of honour, loosing their artists’ rights that went along with their voting rights. Thirdly, because for many years they were boycotted both by the art world and the audience, and lost incomes from the art market, a loss that was not intended by the sentence. Most of them are almost forgotten today.
Those who were sentenced only in the courts of honour, lost some of their rights for a shorter or longer time. But in addition, they were also boycotted for a long period by the art world and the audience, and lost incomes from the art market. This was a major punishment for mostly small offenses.
Most of them are also forgotten today.
Afterthoughts
However, the rapid growth in art sales during the occupation can indicate that the passive resistance did not cost the artists dearly – on the contrary, their sales would perhaps have suffered if they had not taken part in it. It is therefore a question as to how ideologically motivated the passive resistance was. Artists that were members of NS and others that did not followed up the passive resistance do seem to have been subject to a certain boycott on the art market already during the occupation.
The art field found its way of resistance by rejection to utilize the art political resources controlled by the führer regime, by avoiding contact with its bodies and institutions, by avoiding being evalued by the evaluating bodies of the führer regime, and by letting their artistic activities taking a more private and non-representative form. Few lost economically by that, as was the case in the other cultural fields, as theatre, music and literature.
Et eksempel er grafikeren Lilla Hellesen. Hun skrev i et brev til Quisling i 1941 bl.a.: ”Den ledende kunstnerklikk blant malerne, ”Kunstnerforbunds-klikken”, har de siste årtier øvet et jernhårdt diktatur overfor oss som sto utenfor. De hadde all makt over kunstlivet i Norge.”[9] Hun har selv slitt seg frem, skriver hun, fått et lite publikum. Ble boikottet etter at hun på kunstnermøter har uttalt glødende begeistring for NS. Hun mener at folk sniker. ”Ukjente og ubetydelige kunstnere slutter opp om NS for å opnå noget, mens de store, kjente kunstnerne er fanatiske mot NS. Og Hamsun og Sinding er bare undtagelser som bekrefter regelen”. Hun mener at det å være kjent og betydelig er et resultat av maktforholdene. Hennes motstandere var følgende:
1 Internasjonale moteretninger (”lancert av jødiske kunstrevyer i utlandet”)
2 Kritikerne, som roste K-klikken
3 Nasjonalgalleriets ledelse som favoriserte K-klikken
4 Kunstakademiets malerprofessorer
5 Stipendkomitéene
6 BKS (”heldigvis nu avskaffet”)
7 KUD (som innhenter ”råd” fra de man klaget på)
8 Den faste jury, hvor K-klikken ved et særlig valgsystem har sikret seg flertall
9 De store ”petit-journalister”, som reklamerte for K-klikken
10 Gyldendals forlag, med sin serie kunstnerbiografier
Dette er ingen dårlig analyse av maktforhold i norsk kunstliv på 1930-tallet.
Søren Onsager was a loser in relation to the tendencies in art that the BKS-regime supported. He lost the competition for the professorship in painting at the Art Academy in 1925, and stood outside the more constructive tendencies that come to dominate Norwegian contemporary art in the 1930’s. Onsager used his prominent position in the führer regime to support younger artists whose more traditional art had little support in the BKS-regime. Even more important is that he polarized the differences between is own artistic position and the more modern, by calling the art of the other side non-art – entarted. Wilhelm Rasmussen did not have the same need for self-promotion, because the dominating tradition in contemporary Norwegian sculpture at that time was quite traditional, more like the one favoured by NS-circles.
Det midlertidige rådets seksjon for billedkunst arbeidet særlig med tre kunstpolitiske saker: reorganisering av Statens kunstakademi, stipendietildelinger, og planer for Nasjonalgalleriet. I en møteprotokoll fra 13. november 1940 til 13. mai 1941er fremgår det at det da er holdt 8 møter.[10] Av sakene som ble behandlet er ny kombinert fonds- og stipendiekomité; utvidelse av kunstakademiet med tegneklasse, dekorativt maleri, staffelimaleri, avdeling for materiallære, avdeling for anatomi, forberedende avdeling for billedhuggere, avdeling for teori og kunsthistorie, nybygg med plass til en grafikk-avdeling, og flytting til Sandvika; utskillelse av det opprinnelige skulpturmuseum med egen konservator og eget innkjøpsråd; forhøyelse av kunstnergasjene; et nytt aktuelt kunsttidsskrift; egen avdeling i Nasjonalgalleriet for nyinnkjøpt kunst, som kunne være der i 10 år; nytt bygg for skulptur og samtidsavdeling på Tullinløkka; rådet påtok seg å være innkjøpskomité inntil videre for Nasjonalgalleriet; utskifting av kritikere som ikke makter å gjennomføre ”en strengt saklig kritikk”, og at kunstkritikere bør overvåke alts som skrives om bildende kunst i avisene; forhåndssensur av billeder som selges ved auksjoner og i rammeforretninger; kritikk av malerier bør gjøres av malere og skulptur av billedhuggere, og at kritikere ikke bør være forpliktet til å kritisere andre utstillinger enn de som interesserer dem rent saklig; landets rammeforretninger skal ikke få drive kunsthandel, fordi de ”er håndverkere og skal ha nok med det”; etableringen av et kunstnerlaug.
De fleste sakene var ideer som ble luftet, og senere ikke bragt videre mot realisering. Så vidt vi kan se var det bare forhøyelse av kunstnergasjene som ble realisert.
Litterature
Eriksen, Arild H. (1990) Kunst og ukunst. Aspekter ved nyordningen av kunstlivet i Norge 1940-45, MA Dissertation, Institute of art history, University of Bergen.
Grimelund, Josef Jervel and Flønes, Olav (1954) Trondhjems Kunstforening 1845-1945, Trondhjems kunstforening.
Møller, Arvik (1996) Søyle i skyggeland. Billedhuggeren Wilhelm Rasmussen, Grøndahl Dreyer.
Solhjell, Dag (2004) Akademiregime og Kunstinstitusjon. Kunstpolitikk fram til 1850, Unipub.
Solhjell, Dag (2005a) Fra embetsmannsregime til nytt akademiregime. Kunstpoliltikk 1850-1940, Unipub.
Solhjell, Dag (2005b) Fra akademiregime til fagforeningsregime. Kunstpolitikk 1940-1980, Unipub.
Solhjell, Dag (2006) Kuratorene kommer. Kunstpolitikk 1980-2006, Unipub.
Solhjell, Dag and Dahl, Hans Fredrik (2013) Men viktigst er æren. Oppgjøret blant kunstnerne etter 1945,Pax.
[1] This article is based on two main sources: 1) The author’s Phd. dissertation “Kunstpolitikk 1814-2006” (“Norwegian art policy 1814-2006”, and particularly its 3. Volume “Fra akademiregime til fagforeningsregime. Kunstpolitikk 1940-1980”. See Solhjell (2004, 2005a, 2005b and 2006). 2) «Men viktigst er æren. Oppgjøret blant kunstnerne etter 1945» («But most important is the honour. The settling of account among artists after 1945” co-written with Hans Fredrik Dahl. See Solhjell and Dahl 2013.
[2] Solhjell (2004:19-20).
[3] (KF), saksarkiv, boks 48. Legg om BKS (i legg om Statens Kunstakademi). Avskrift av brev av 11. januar 1941 fra BKS v/Ulrik Hendriksen til KoF.
[4] Solhjell (2005a).
[5] Nasjonalbiblioteket, BKS, møteprotokoll 1.4.38.
[6] Eriksen (1990:54)
[7] Møller (1996).
[8] Grimelund and Flønes (1954).
[9] Kilde: RA, Landssvikarkivet.
[10] Protokollen befinner seg i mappen for Rudolph Thygesen i Landsvikarkivet. Thygesen var ikke medlem av NS. Protokollen kan tyde på at rådets første møte ble holdt 13. november 1940.