Bjarni Benediktsson painting absent from Höfði anniversary display

A portrait of former Reykjavik mayor and prime minister Bjarni Benediktsson was not displayed at Höfði during events marking 40 years since the Reagan-Gorbachev summit, Morgunblaðið reports.

Guðbrandur Benediktsson, director of the Reykjavik City Museum, told the newspaper that displaying the same artworks in the ground-floor room where US President Ronald Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev met was never discussed when a history corner was prepared there. The works included the portrait of Bjarni and a painting by Louisa Matthíasdóttir.

Chairs and Reykjavik flags were arranged in the main room for US Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s recent visit, at the request of Iceland’s Foreign Ministry, to recreate the setting of a famous photograph of the two leaders. Bjarni’s portrait was not in the room.

The painting was last displayed at Höfði 10 years ago, for the summit’s 30th anniversary. It hung in an east-side sitting room, where Ásgrímur Jónsson’s painting The Pond, Seen from Þingholtin now hangs. The artworks in the house were not otherwise rearranged specifically for the 40th anniversary, apart from a history exhibition in a room on the upper floor.