Event, a Chargeurs Museum Studio company, is celebrating the opening of the Carl Nielsen Museum in Odense, Denmark. The experience design agency worked with Odense City Museums and Copenhagen University to create a brand new, immersive visitor experience for the city.
The goal was to offer a place where people can feel and experience music as a living force, and the experience is enriched by the playfulness and element of surprise which is found in Nielsen’s works.
Nielsen is one of the most influential people in Danish musical history, and visitors are encouraged to explore the complex man behind the music at the experiential new venue.
Three unique movements
The exhibition is composed of three movements. Visitors can tune in to the experience during the opening movement, Fyn – Copenhagen – Europe. Here, they learn more about Nielsen, the place where he grew up and found inspiration, as well as the visual language of the experience.
The Composer, the second movement, explores specific elements of Nielsen’s music and life. As they move around the room, visitors engage with the cabinets, removing lids and opening doors to play music and discover stories.
The experience comes to a dramatic conclusion in the third and last movement, The Music. Visitors can fully immerse themselves in the music here. They will hear a brand-new composition made of snippets from Nielsen’s works that draws influence from Nielsen’s Sixth (and final) Symphony, a fascinating collage of contrasting sections with disruptions that create surprise.
Taking inspiration from music
The materiality of the space is influenced by concert hall drapery and acoustics as well as musical instruments like Nielsen’s lacquered violin and the glossy brass of his bugle. The delicate curves and stems of musical notation serve as an influence for the typography.
Throughout the three movements, Nielsen’s life and creative drive are shown as an energy current that flows through everything it touches, much like an electrical charge.
The space is altered as light pulses through. Nielsen’s inspiration and the elements that made him who he is serve as the experience’s initial spark. Then it turns into a constellation of light, with each fragment denoting a section of Nielsen’s musical catalogue. Visitors can finally “step into” Nielsen’s music as the light culminates into a single, full whole.
This is the second major museum to open in the city in recent times, following the inauguration of H.C. Andersen’s House in April 2022. Here, visitors are welcomed into the fanciful world of Hans Christian Andersen, who is well known for his fairy tales. Event designed the exhibition and the masterplan for this venue.
Event was also chosen to provide masterplanning, interpretative planning, exhibition and graphic design and creative direction for a unique new museum in Oman. The Oman Across Ages Museum opened in March 2023 after nearly a decade of work. The space celebrates the creation of a nation and the endeavours of its people.
Top image credit Carl Nielsen Museet
