2017-project of the week - The Manors - Gateway to Europe (Djursland)

In collaboration with the European Capital of Culture Aarhus 2017, Danish Centre for Manor Research and Gammel Estrup - The Manor Museum create new knowledge about the estates and their importance as cultural powerhouses in a European context.

Did you know that manors have been the leading cultural hub of the region, and not least that they have played a major part in the development of the common cultural heritage in Europe? No, right?

With a new project supported by Aarhus 2017, we now have the opportunity to gain new knowledge and experience manors and their residents through new forms of communication that create live meetings between history and the present. And for professionals, new forms of cooperation will be initiated.

Cultural powerhouses
Historically, the Danish manors were cultural powerhouses, where the latest trends from Europe came to Denmark. Through its educational travels, the nobility brought new architecture, literature, art, food, languages and general cultural flows back from the big world. The manors were simply the gateway to Europe and to the impulses that few Danes had the opportunity to become acquainted with on their own.

"At the manors around Europe were people who had the time, money and energy to travel and meet other cultures and ways of life. Take for example the Manor Scheel (editor’s note: in 2015, Sostrup by Grenaa). From here, 'The Wild Count' Jørgen Scheel travelled to Europe, and brought home his knowledge of the latest trends in architecture and art. The Count used the knowledge to decorate Scheel with some of the most modern one could imagine. You had to go to Copenhagen to find something similar. Here was the latest in wallpapers, furniture, arts and a huge library. He also lent out his books to people in the region."

So says Project Officer Mikael Frausing from the Danish Centre for Manor Research on the project that will help create new knowledge about the status of the manors, and not least their position as powerhouses in the development of a common European identity.

Common heritage
"Castles and manor houses that have been economic and cultural beacons in a region are located in many European countries. Just think of the many castles and manors in the UK, France, Germany and the Czech Republic. They have been centres from which culture, art, architecture and philosophy have been presented and used. There is much hidden knowledge in the old buildings and the stories of those we must share, for they represent a common European heritage and are pawns in the development of a common European identity," says Mikael Frausing.

That is why the funding from the Aarhus 2017 Foundation among other things will be used to establish a common platform among European manor museums, which cultivate the forgotten knowledge of the estates and their cultural significance. A network that does not exist today.

Live meetings between then and now
Besides the common European perspective, the project also focuses on creating live meetings between history and the present. In addition to events at Old Estrup - The Manor Museum, this is done through a series of events and activities at the four East Jutland manor houses; Rosenholm, Bidstrup, Clausholm and Sostrup, where the audience is located at the cross-section of history and life in a modern company as it is lived on the estates today.

Or as Mikael Frausings puts it: "We bring the audience as close as possible, by allowing the communication to be performed where the story took place."

However, the audience already has the opportunity to follow one of those who brought Europe to the region. On Facebook, you can be friends with 'The Wild Count' Jørgen Scheel, and follow his great travels through Europe. Through documents, letters, photographs, maps and drawings, we follow the Count’s travels and as bonus get a number of stories and facts about the journey and places.

"At the time, taking educational journeys were part of the upbringing of the nobility's sons. They had to learn to navigate in diplomacy and in political life. But basically, it is in the journey that we form ourselves in the encounter with the strange. It is the same then, as it is now," says Mikael Frausing, who invites to the first public event on January 31 at Old Estrup, where the author Carsten Jensen and Professor Jørn Lund give their take on the modern educational journey.