Vilhelm Wohlert (27 May 1920 – 10 May 2007) was a Danish

architect An architect is a person who plans, designs, and oversees the construction of buildings. To practice architecture means to provide services in connection with the design of buildings and the space within the site surrounding the buildings that h ...

. His most notable work was on the

Louisiana Museum of Modern Art The Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, also known as the Louisiana, is an art museum located north of Copenhagen, Denmark. Attracting over 700,000 guests annually, the Louisiana is Scandinavia's most visited museum for Modern art, modern and contempor ...

in Humlebæk, Denmark.

Early life and education

Wohlert was born in

Copenhagen Copenhagen ( ) is the capital and most populous city of Denmark, with a population of 1.4 million in the Urban area of Copenhagen, urban area. The city is situated on the islands of Zealand and Amager, separated from Malmö, Sweden, by the ...

, Denmark. He trained at the

Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts The Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts () has provided education in the arts for more than 250 years, playing its part in the development of the art of Denmark. History The Royal Danish Academy of Portraiture, Sculpture, and Architecture in Cope ...

' School of Architecture, where one of his teachers was

Kaare Klint Kaare Klint (15 December 1888 – 28 March 1954) was a Danish architect and furniture designer, known as the father of modern Danish furniture design. His style was epitomized by clean, pure lines, use of the best materials of his time and ...

(1888–1954). From 1946-47, he worked in

Stockholm Stockholm (; ) is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in Sweden by population, most populous city of Sweden, as well as the List of urban areas in the Nordic countries, largest urban area in the Nordic countries. Approximately ...

with the architects

Sven Markelius Sven Gottfrid Markelius (25 October 1889 – 24 February 1972) was a Swedish modernist architect. Markelius played an important role in the post-war urban planning of Stockholm, for example in the creation of the model suburbs of Vällingby (1950 ...

and Hakon Ahlberg, both practitioners of Scandinavian modernism. He also worked in collaboration with Kaare Klint until his death in 1954.

Career

Louisiana Museum of Modern Art - detail 01

In 1958, he and his partner and fellow architect

Jørgen Bo Jørgen is a Danish, Norwegian, and Faroese masculine given name cognate to George People with the given name Jørgen * Jørgen Aall (1771–1833), Norwegian ship-owner and politician * Jørgen Andersen (1886–1973), Norwegian gymnast * Jørgen ...

(1919–1999) started work on the Danish modernist architecture

in Humlebæk, a project on which they would work for the next 33 years. In Germany, they were also responsible for the

Bochum Bochum (, ; ; ; ) is a city in North Rhine-Westphalia. With a population of 372,348 (April 2023), it is the sixth-largest city (after Cologne, Düsseldorf, Dortmund, Essen and Duisburg) in North Rhine-Westphalia, the most populous German federa ...

Museum of Art (''Kunstmuseum Bochum'') which opened in 1960, as well as the Gustav-Lübcke-Museum in

Hamm Hamm may refer to: Places ;Germany: * Hamm, North Rhine-Westphalia, a city north-east of Dortmund * Hamm (Sieg), a municipality in the eponymous ''Verbandsgemeinde'' in the district of Altenkirchen, Rhineland-Palatinate * Hamm, Bitburg-Prüm, part ...

, which was commissioned in 1993. Another major part of Wohlert's work was on Danish churches. He designed Stengård Church (''Stengård kirke'') and worked on the restoration of both the Lutheran and Catholic cathedrals of Copenhagen: the Church of Our Lady and

St. Ansgar's Church St. Ansgar's Church is a parish church of the Roman Catholic Church in Norway, Roman Catholic Church in Kristiansand, Norway. It is the only Roman Catholic church building in Agder county in Southern Norway. The first church was built in 1936. ...

. He also designed the mausoleum of

King Frederik IX Frederik IX (Christian Frederik Franz Michael Carl Valdemar Georg; 11 March 1899 – 14 January 1972) was King of Denmark from 1947 to 1972. Frederik was born into the House of Glücksburg during the reign of his great-grandfather King Ch ...

Roskilde Cathedral Roskilde Cathedral (), in the city of Roskilde on the island of Zealand (Denmark), Zealand (''Sjælland'') in eastern Denmark, is a cathedral of the Lutheranism, Lutheran Church of Denmark. The cathedral is one of the most important churches in D ...

. Wohlert was also an educator, early in his career at

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California), is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Berkeley, California, United States. Founded in 1868 and named after t ...

where he was also awarded the post of visiting professor at the University of California, Berkeley from 1951 through 1953. Later for many years as a professor at the

where he held the position of professor from 1968 until 1986.

Distinctions

* 1982 Dreyer Honorary Award

References

Other sources

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Wohlert, Vilhelm Modernist architects from Denmark Knights of the Order of the Dannebrog Architects from Copenhagen 1920 births 2007 deaths Recipients of the Eckersberg Medal Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts alumni Recipients of the C.F. Hansen Medal