Vilhelm Hammershøi, The Music Room

Interior. The Music Room, Strandgade 30 by the great Danish master Vilhelm Hammershøi has hung for over three-quarters of a century on the very wall it depicts in the artist’s Copenhagen apartment, which he occupied with his wife Ida from 1898 until 1908.

Speaking to the artwork is legendary Danish architect Bjarke Ingels, who relates Hammershøi’s ability to find “meaning in the mundane” to the challenges of his own profession when orchestrating all the practicalities of everyday life in the most poetic way possible. Also speaking about the painting is Nina Wedell-Wedellsborg, head of Sotheby’s Denmark, and international specialist Claude Penning who delve into the provenance of the painting and their own personal connection to it.