Gothenburg Museum of Art

The museum stands at the top of the Avenyn behind Milles's Poseidon fountain, in a brick building put up for the 1923 exhibition. Its centre is the Fursten hall on the top floor, top-lit, hung with Nordic painting of the 1880s and 90s - Zorn, Larsson, Hammershoi, Munch, Kroyer, Josephson - which is the strongest single room of that material anywhere. Around it are older European painting including Rembrandt and Rubens, a French section with Monet and Van Gogh, and twentieth-century Swedish work. Hasselblad Center in the same building runs photography exhibitions. The collection came largely from Gothenburg merchant money in the decades either side of 1900.

Background

The collection holds more than 70,000 works, mostly Nordic art from the 15th century to the present, which makes it the third largest art museum in Sweden by number of works, after the Nationalmuseum and the Moderna museet in Stockholm. The museum opened in 1925 and stands on Götaplatsen at the southern end of the Avenyn. Its building has been individually listed since April 2017, it was named Swedish Museum of the Year in 2018, and about 250,000 people visit each year.

Source: Wikipedia, "Gothenburg Museum of Art"

What you'll find

• The Fursten hall - top-lit, Nordic painting of the 1880s and 90s.
• Zorn, Larsson, Hammershoi, Munch - the core of that room.
• Older European painting - Rembrandt, Rubens and others.
• Hasselblad Center - photography in the same building.

When to go

Year round; closed Mondays. Two hours.

Before you go

Parts of the building have been under renovation with galleries closed. Labelling is uneven in English. The Nordic hall is the reason to come and the rest is patchier. Gotaplatsen is exposed and windy.

Nearby

Rohsska design museum is down the Avenyn; Slottsskogen is west.

Key facts