Rosemaling

Google has a lot to answer for.

I really need to get a life, but there's so much interesting

and fascinating stuff to look at and read about

that it's lure is, at times, completely irresistable.
 

 

 

Enter a word, follow a link, visit a site and before

you know it you're up to your neck in porn!

Good job it only got as far as my neck.

I must get my filters sorted out

- hey, but what's the rush?
 

  

I was always one for a long preamble,

preferably with ice but no lemon.

Still that's another story so let's cut to the chase.

 

Norwegian rosemaling is definately back in vogue

due for the most part to the enormous success of

Disney's latest offering - Frozen.

This beautiful Norwegian folk art adorns just about

everything in the film from stout, ancient doors

to Elsa the Snow Queen's dress.

Not even Sven the reindeer's harness has been

allowed to escape unembelished.

  

 

Rosemaling developed in Norway during the mid

eighteenth century out of the classic European styles

of the day such as Baroque, Regency and Rococo.
 

  

It soon became a style of decoration in it's own right

which finally spread across the entire country

with different regions having very distinctive

characteristics of their own.  Examples of some of

the finest work being found in the Telemark

and Hallingdal valleys.
 

 

Rosemaling even crossed the Atlantic to America

borne on the trunks and textiles of Norwegian

migrants to the new world.  It eventually went out of

vogue towards the end of the nineteenth century,

as did many other forms of folk art, only to be

"defrosted" by a new generation some one hundred

and fifty years on.

 

To sum it all up in a few words (yes Camilla, I'm well

aware that I do go on a bit at times), for me it's

"Jacobean meets Barge Art".

There - I've finished!

 

Cold never bothered me anyway!