Faroese paintings and art - sales and exhibitions

At gallery Lars Borella we sell and display original paintings by well-known painters and artists from the Faroe Islands. Among the Faroese works of art you can buy are oil paintings, acrylic paintings, watercolours and lithography. The art we showcase and sell represents a large variety of genre and motives. It is thus possible to experience expressionism, coloristic, modern, abstract, and figurative art at our gallery. If you have a special interest in Faroese painters and artists, you can learn much more in the following.

Faroese paintings and art in the Danish Galley Lars Borella

On this site you will find an introduction of the Faroese artist we showcase at gallery Lars Borella. The introduction includes a presentation of the Faroese paintings and the history behind the popular artists and the genre. We continuously host exhibits and sell high quality art both to private and cooperate buyers. You can purchase and experience the popular art from the Faroe Islands at our galley in Charlottenlund – or order through our webpage.

Feel the spirit and the craft of the Faroese artists

The following nine Faroese artists are represented at Lars Borella Gallery at the moment: Zacharias Heinesen, Hansina Iversen, Bárdur Jakupsson, Anker Mortensen, Torbjørn Olsen, Marius Olsen, Hans Pauli Olsen, Trondur Patursson and Bjarne Werner Sørensen. In addition to these, the gallery is pleased to welcome two new Faroese painters: Silja Strøm and Hanni Bjartalid. They will both be displayed in the gallery in Ordrup from January 2023.

The history of the Faroese paintings and their way to becoming popular

Viewing the Faroese paintings from its origin and to what we know as modern Faroese paintings today, we are looking at a timeline of more than a hundred years. The development and expression of the art and paintings stems from the painter Samuel Joensen Mikines and his return to the Faroe Island in 1932 after completing his education at the art academy in Copenhagen.

Faroese art quickly made an impact and thus within thirty years of Samuels return, the Faroese paintings were nationally acknowledged as an artform. Mikines settled down in Torshavn, but he spends much time painting and visiting his family in the city he was born, Mykines. Mikines paintings varied between showing landscapes and portraits – the latter mostly of his family. Mikines painted the landscape of the Faroes Islands – his paintings were colourful and the Faeroese people were portrayed one by one. Other relevant painters from that time are Ruth Smith, Ingalvur av Reyni and Steffan Danielsen.

The Faroese artists in the gallery – their paintings, the genre and the artistic expression

Zacharias Heinesen

Zacharias Heinesen artistic expression stems from nature and an expressionistic mode of expression. He makes use of a triangular expression when painting views of the sea. Zacharias Heinesen is very interested the French painter Cézanne and in French modernism. At first Heinesens paintings seem to be abstract art but looking closer the motives start to appear through the colours: A house, a sea, a sky.

Zacharias Heinesens work is under the influence of the strong Faroese tradition of nature paintings. In contrast to the older and more classical art tradition, he is dissolving his motives into simplicity. The outcome is that individual forms and parts are appearing as a new coherent whole – a new reality. See: Art for sale by Zacharias Heinesen

Torbjørn Olsen

Tróndur Patursson

Tróndur Patursson paints with tempera on canvas. The title of most of his paintings is ´Inspired by Nature´. His paintings are abstract and usually constructed from a multitude of black dots on a monochrome foundation of either blue, red, yellow, grey or green. The dots on the monochrome foundation give the paintings an inscrutable depth. His paintings bear personal witness. Thus, Patursson uses his boat to get very close to the mountains where birds live to experience them up close and to be able to capture every little detail on camera. The black dots in Tróndur Paturssons paintings turn into cliffs, and erratic birds, when looking at them. He is also known for his birds made of glass. See: Art for sale by Tróndur Patursson

Bárdur Jakupsson

The painter Bárdur Jakupsson is inspired by the Faroese mountains – both those that appear in the sea and those inland. Throughout all his paintings he makes use of a brushstroke painted from the bottom and upwards. His brushstroke remains the same regardless of the season he is panting – winter, spring, summer or fall – fog, rain or summer sun. The brushstroke always creates a pointy profile. His paintings are a form of abstract expressionism, although the painter never ceases to be in control. The strokes of Bárdur Jakupssons brush create an image of beautiful rhythm and colours representing the delicate French aesthetics, he was taught at the art academy of Copenhagen. See: Art for sale by Bárdur Jakupsson

Marius Olsen

Marius Olsen’s works are tangible examples of the boundless possibilities within lithography, intaglio and relief printing. They show how these technologies will continue to be an inspiring artistic medium in the future. A unique characteristic in his works is how subtly and precisely they are executed, leaving viewers in no need of making their mind up about the medium used; instead, they can be submerged in the artistic encounter. The basic ideas and experiences take often years to mature before the result is ready to print, number and sign. The printing process is so complicated that only a few prints are ever adorned with a signature. See: Art for sale by Marius Olsen

Hans Pauli Olsen

Hans Pauli Olsen creates portraits and sculptures. He went to the art academy of Copenhagen, where he learned from Professor Willy Ørskov and Professor Bjørn Nørgaard. However, he did not take from any of the two professors. Unlike them he creates in a naturalistic manner. When Hans Pauli Olsen creates his sculptures, he does so in an expressionist manner, where signs from the creative process still show, even after the sculptures have been moulded in clay and cast in bronze. His role model is August Rodin. Hans Pauli Olsen is a member of Grønningen Art Association. See: Art for sale by Hans Pauli Olsen

Hanni Bjartalid

Hanni Bjartalid’s works – which can be both paintings and three-dimensional works – are at once sensual, expressive, naive, decorative, intellectual, wavering, sincere, subtle and chaotic. Hanni Bjartalid manages to create a synthesis of all these elements. He manages to collect it or perhaps rather sample it. All the time he takes something and turns it into something else. The elaborate is sampled with something spontaneous, the adult is sampled with something childish, and the wonderful thing is that it becomes neither one nor the other, it becomes neither spontaneous, adult nor childish. See: Art for sale by Hanni Bjartalid

Anker Mortensen

Anker Mortensen is a painter and as such one of the finest colourists in the Faroese Islands. He represents a sensitivity and a sense of colour, that is highly unique. Anker Mortensen’s motives are not religious in a spiritual way but represents a form of naturistic religion. Anker Mortensen is somehow able to provide colours with an almost cosmic quality. He approaches nature, especially the sea, in an almost divine manner and with an urge to reach behind the visible and into a more cosmic shape. It is no coincidence that Anker Mortens has named one of his paintings after a psalm by Thomas Kingo: ´As the Golden Sun Emerge´. Other paintings are named after Johannes Gospel: ´The Wind will Blow wherever it goes´. See: Art for sale by Anker Mortensen

Hansina Iversen

Hansina Iversen is a painter, who works with a form of visual blur and at the same time an abstract mode of expression. Her paintings very much show erotic sensibility. Even though the paintings are blurred in the shapes and the showed movements are in slow motion in an almost trance – or dream like manner, her precision is undeniable. There is no doubt about what her paintings show. The shapes are alive and lovingly slides in and out between each other as a form of plasma – forever changeable, but also connected in a form a passionate creation. See: Art for sale by Hansina Iversen

Bjarne Werner Sørensen