Denmark’s museum for public art

As Denmark’s only museum for public art, KØS collects sketches, scale models, and a variety of other preliminary works for the art that is placed or takes place in public spaces in Denmark. These are artworks that many feel ownership of because they are close to us in everyday life, and therefore are often the subject of wonder, discussion, disapproval, and interest among local users.

The finished works are typically placed permanently somewhere out there, unless they take place as temporary projects that over a period occur in more or less direct interaction with the audience. The works themselves therefore do not form part of the museum’s collection, which instead through drawings, watercolors, and models in plaster, clay, paper, and wood or in the form of project descriptions, notes and sketches, films and photos etc., shows the quality of and the range in the country’s publicly placed works.

The collection’s often impressive sketch sequences, which typically can accommodate many phases in the artistic creation process - from early, loose drafts to gradually more detailed studies and composition sketches to final, thoroughly worked templates and working drawings - can be studied when the museum shows collection exhibitions.

The Queen’s tapestries

The main works in the museum’s collection are visual artist Bjørn Nørgaard’s extensive sketch material for Queen Margrethe II’s tapestries, which she received as a gift from Danish Business in 2000. The sketch material for the 10-year-long work process consists of 11 colorful cartoons in full size with a wealth of historical motifs.

Changing collection exhibitions The KØS Collection is regularly shown in collection exhibitions at the museum and typically consists of a mix of new acquisitions and known works from the collection. Read about our current exhibitions here. The collection consists of more than 18,000 unique sketches, models and preliminary works for art in public spaces and an archive that documents processes and conflicts around art in public spaces. Selections from the collection are regularly exhibited at the museum and activated in KØS’ teaching, just as artists are periodically invited to engage in dialogue with the KØS collection and KØS as an institution.

Explore indoors over three floors or outside on the artistic forecourt by visual artist Ann Lislegaard.

Combine the visit with a trip to the KØS Café and the museum shop with exclusive design items.

Free guided tour the first Sunday of every month."

Current exhibitions:

'IN THE ARCHITECHT’S HOUSE - ELINA BROTHERUS ON ALVAR AALTO'; 01.03.24-04.08.24

In her three new photographic series, visual artist Elina Brotherus takes us deep into the heart of Alvar Aalto’s architecture. The new photographic series by Elina Brotherus, one of Finland’s most internationally acclaimed artists, are captured in three key Aalto buildings in Finland: Aalto’s home in Helsinki, his summer cottage also known as the ‘Experimental House,’ and the modernist masterpiece Paimio Sanatorium.

The three new series are now being exhibited for the first time in Denmark through a collaboration between KØS Museum of Art in Public Spaces and the Alvar Aalto Museum, where they premiered in 2023. In 2019, the Aalto Foundation granted the artist exclusive access to photograph in Alvar and Aino Aalto’s home in Helsinki and Alvar’s and his second wife Elissa’s private summer villa, the Experimental House in Muuratsalo. The summer villa is a pilgrimage destination for designers and architects due to the couple’s numerous material experiments conducted in the central, beautiful courtyard. It is brought to life in Elina Brotherus’ masterfully composed photographs and takes on a new vitality and presence.

Bjørn Nørgaard’s sketches for the Queen’s tapestries

In 2001, KØS acquired visual artist Bjørn Nørgaard’s 1:1 cartons for the Queen’s tapestries, which can be experienced in the Tapestry Hall on the 3rd floor of the museum. With an enormous wealth of detail and a vivid color palette, Bjørn Nørgaard has depicted 1,000 years of Danish history in the form of 17 tapestries that stretches from the age of the Vikings through the Middle Ages and the Reformation through the dictatorship and World War II to our time and the future. Through a multitude of events, people and symbols, Bjørn Nørgaard presents his view of the course of history, where Danish history intertwines with world history, religious history and the history of art and culture. Meet a diverse gallery of people who have all left their distinct mark on history – from Jeanne D’Arc and Niels Bohr to John F. Kennedy and Karen Blixen.