I live close to the wonderful Vigeland sculpture park in Oslo. It’s the masterpiece of sculptor Gustav Vigeland and one of the biggest tourist attractions in Norway. It’s free to visit and open 24 hours a day.

When you live close to such an impressive place you start taking it for granted. While people come from the other side of the world and have an experience they will never forget I walk through the park on my way to work.

The park includes 212 sculptures. Most of them showing people of different ages, moods and situations.

I have taken a lot of pictures of the statues, and through the year they change as the light, temperature and surroundings go through winter, spring, summer and autoumn.

During one of our many walks in this park my wife pointed out that it’s interesting to look at the people gazing at the statues.

How they pose in front of them when taking pictures and how they behave when observing them.

So yesterday I brought my new Canon PowerShot S2 IS and snapped some pictures of the real people instead of the statues (more info and experience with the PowerShot in an article here later).

Less than half an hour and I had a lot of interesting images.
(Click the pictures to enlarge)

Comparing the facial expressions of the statues and the people…

Comparing situations in the park with situations in the sculptures…

Or starting to see communication between statue and photographer…

Or simply realizing some slightly amusing situations…

There have been some discussions around the fact that the statues mostly show the so called “Aryan” editions of our species. Who cares? When the park is filled with people this place resembles one of the most international and open places in Norway.

Walking trhough the park on my way home after a late night in the city is of course a totally different experience than walking around with a lot of people in bright daylight. How people use the park during winter is of course totally different from how it is used during summer.

For those of you that want to comment on the individual pictures, see some additional ones or post your own pictures from this park I have made a Flickr Group with my images.

Living so close to the park I guess I’ll have to post back here as this little “The people of the Vigeland Sculpture Park” project evolves…