Ever since he was a Donald-saved child, William Heimdal has been a favorite interview subject. He has been called “a rarely gifted boy” by Vebjørn Sand. He has been mercilessly slaughtered in news. He has accused the Autumn Exhibition of being corrupt and believes that no skilled painters have come out of the Academy of Arts. – I like people to be provoked by things I do and say. If there is an elephant in the room, I think it’s nice to point that out. I like to say what one shouldn’t say, he says. We meet the young painter in his newly moved apartment on Oslo’s western edge. He has thick L, bangs in his hair and meets us wearing a long robe. The large paintings, mostly painted in various shades of brown, take up half the living room floor. Bach thunders in the background – of course on vinyl from an old stereo system. – I am mostly only here at home in the apartment and painting. I have no social life, says Heimdal, who has recently moved to the capital for his girlfriend’s studies. Photo: Xin Li / news Heimdal is the youngest member of the fabled Memorosa group, a small group of classical figurative painters brought up on artist Odd Nerdrum’s philosophy and who have placed themselves on the outside of the Norwegian art scene. Also in the same club is Nerdrum’s son Øde Spildo Nerdrum. The group follows a number of strict dogmas when working. – Blue pigment is a mortal sin, so we do not use it in our paintings. Irony as a tool is also prohibited, says Heimdal. He has far older references than most other 20-year-olds and detests modernism. The goal? To become the best painter in world history. – I hope that by the time I’m 50, I will have surpassed Rembrandt. That’s a goal I have. By the time I’m 30, I should have surpassed Caravaggio, he says seriously. – Everyone is able to recognize a poorly painted face. That’s why you have to be good if you’re going to do this type of painting, he says. The mirror is an important aid when he creates self-portraits. Photo: Xin Li / news Have had film crews in tow for five years Now the need for exposure will be met. Because despite the fact that he himself says he dislikes attention, William Heimdal will appear on several TV productions in the future. In the “Portrettmesterskapet” competition on news TV, he fights to be the best portrait painter among a number of other Norwegian artists. In the programme, they will portray well-known profiles in a blistering four hours, far less time than what most people are used to. The painter was given the task of portraying VGTV profile Morten Hegseth in the “Portrait Championship”. It is one of the worst things he has been involved in. Among those appearing in the “Portrait Championship” are (from left) Nickolay Maltsev, Yvonne Rosten, William Heimdal, Jonathan Chedeville, Gard Sture and Matilda Höög. Photo: TOBIAS EIDSAA BORRESEN Later this year, the documentary film “Renaissance Prince” will also be released, a close portrait of the painter filmed over a period of more than five years – from when he was an anxious ninth-grader until recently. He himself is happy that it is finally over. – It has been an absolutely terrible process. I hate being filmed and being watched, but I have to get my paintings out into the world in order to make a living. That’s why I have to agree to such things, says the painter. He has no plans to watch either the program or the film he himself is in. – I’ll spare myself that. The people who made the documentary are trying to persuade me to attend the premiere, but there is no chance. I’m not joining. WATCH TEASERS: The documentary “Renaissance Prince” will be on news TV later this year. Disgusted by the “runkering” Heimdal does not hide what he thinks of the Norwegian art environment in 2023. He calls the whole thing a “circus”. – There is something about that truncation that I absolutely dislike. It feels fake, almost like some kind of theater. I rather like people to be real, he says. He also believes that classical figurative art does not get enough space in Norwegian art museums, galleries and as recipients of the scholarship schemes. – I think modern artists should be ostracized. They should not receive government support, and in any case they should not have any power. The art community hides a desire for power behind meaningless words and concepts that they call “art”. – Yes. What do you mean? – A modern artist’s task is to make fun of, to mock and to point out what those in power do wrong. But now it is the modernists who are in power themselves, and so they are supposed to criticize the power? There is something jarring, says the painter. “The Prince of Painting” by William Heimdal. Photo: Erla Flyum Thinks Munch was a bad painter Despite sky-high ambitions and a hyper-fixation to be the best, he admits that it takes a lot from him to create a good painting. He calls himself a “bad painter”, and believes it is because it takes him a long time to create a work he is satisfied with. – Edvard Munch was also a bad painter. You can clearly see in his paintings that he has scraped them down with a knife and struggled with them. If he had been good, he would have managed it without all the scraping and toiling, says William Heimdal. He goes on to say that he feels to the very highest degree that there is a market for what he does. But the competition is fierce. There are many talented world-class Norwegian painters, he believes. – People love classic figurative paintings and drawings, and there is great demand. But in the public sector, it has no position. We don’t get decoration commissions, we don’t get grants and we aren’t bought in by the National Museum, for example. But is it really so? SVEIP: It can take him several years to complete one painting. Heimdal produces around five works a year, and makes small sketches before he starts on the canvas. It’s not about figurative language Art critic for news, Mona Pahle Bjerke, believes the reality is that we have very few outstanding classical-figurative artists in Norway today. – These claims from Heimdal are part of a larger victim narrative that Odd Nerdrum and his circle spin around themselves. It is partly conspiratorial, but also has a certain root in reality when it comes to Nerdrum. It is and will be a scandal that he is so poorly represented at the National Museum. Bjerke says that few would have been as happy as her if a great classical figurative talent had appeared. – Somewhat half-successful copies of the old masters are of no interest to anyone. If we had gotten a young Nerdrum onto the art scene today, who was similarly gifted, full of rebellious power and who managed to give his old-mastery expressions a topicality as he did, then nobody today would overlook that person. Ultimately, it’s about quality – not about idiom or style, she believes. – The same applies otherwise in contemporary art; if you haven’t created something new or formulated something in a new and exciting way, then it doesn’t deserve our attention either. Nobody is interested in copies of the great modernists or conceptual artists either, says the art critic. “David with Goliath’s head”. With this work, Heimdal was accepted for the Autumn Exhibition in 2022. Photo: Vegard Kleven Do you want to read more cultural matters? Check these out:
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– Munch was a bad painter – news Culture and entertainment
