New museum in Oksbøl highlights the plight of refugees

Denmark’s first refugee museum – FLUGT: Refugee museum of Denmark – is being built in Oksbøl. The museum, which will tell the story of Denmark’s largest refugee camp and put the flight of people in a global context, is part of Varde municipality’s focus on cultural tourism. The hope is that the museum can inspire debate – for example, by looking at the flight of people from the perspectives of both the refugees and the recipient country.

 

The project, which is designed by the architect group BIG, includes the renovation of two hospital buildings from the original World War 2 refugee camp and the construction of a new extension that will connect the existing buildings and house the arrival hall. Besides exhibitions, which can be experienced both inside the museum and out in the plantation, there will be educational facilities that can, for example, be offered for use by the municipality’s schools and day-care institutions.

 

The museum is jointly financed by the local authority and private citizens via donations, crowdfunding and subsidies from the municipality, foundations, the government and the German Bundestag (parliament). KommuneKredit has supplied interim financing to the project via a construction credit for capital expenditure in connection with the establishment of the museum.

 

“The establishment of FLUGT (‘Flee’) is the culmination of many years of tenacious work to find funding for the project, which has been realised through donations and subsidies from both Denmark and Germany. Some of the donations arrived late in the project, so being able to break ground necessitated that we find interim financing in the form of a construction credit through KommuneKredit, for which the Municipality of Varde fortunately acted as guarantor.”

 

Claus Jensen
Museum Director