Maihaugen's Christmas tree 2018

Kjell Erik Killi-Olsen has been described as art's pop star. He creates art that hits right in the heart and is famous for his distinctive figures from the fantasy world.

Dead pine

Killi-Olsen has chosen a dead pine with two trunks for this year's edition of Maihaugen's Christmas tree. The artist has filled the tree with sculptures made especially for the occasion.

The figures are imaginative, vulnerable, humorous and grotesque. They represent something existential and vulnerable like Christmas can be for many of us.

The two-trunked tree, together with the 66 figures, forms a totality. The tree is made to make us think of and accept what is different.

Every year since 2008 Maihaugen has exhibited a tall Christmas tree in the museum's Visitor Center with decorations made by Norwegian artists and designers.

Photo: Dag Asle Langø

Read more and see the previous artists

Created at the artist's medieval farm

Killi-Olsen is one of our most prestigious and renowned contemporary artists. He is a painter, drawer, graphic artist and sculptor.

He has received several awards in Norway and has regular exhibitions across Europe and America. Last in The Queen Sonja Art Stable earlier this year.

The artist has created the sculptures for Maihaugen's Christmas tree at his medieval farm Sandbu in Vågå in Gudbrandsdalen, where he moved to last summer.

See all of Maihaugen's exhibitions.