The Kautokeino Rural Museum is situated on a large plain near the breadth of the Kautokeino river, centrally located in the Kautokeino church community centre. This outdoor complex, which is comprised of buildings moved to this site, demonstrates the multifaceted nature of the old Sámi culture, namely those living in the inland area. A culture involving: reindeer herding and farming, fishing- and hunting turf huts, hayfields and complexes for river fishing. Here one finds small and simple buildings made of woodwork and sod. They illustrate the traditional Sámi relationship with the nature. The buildings that were eventually moved to this rural museum were registered and measured by the architect Kjell Borgen in the 1950s.

The old buildings' use of materials and size was taken into consideration when the new building was added to the museum complex. The new building has a large tarred wooden roof that is drawn downwards over the walls. Sod mounds are built up around the walls in order to suggest turf huts, figuratively drawing the visitor backwards in time. The earthen mounds also serve to protect from floods. A heavy flood on the Kautokeino waterways occurs roughly once during a span of one hundred years.

1986-1987

Borgen, Bing Lorentzen &

Krishna AS

Guovdageainnu Gilisillju

Museum

exhibitions

Woodwork

stone

sod

Sami

museum

woodwork

stone

sod

turf hut

farm building

Byggekunst 7/1990, pp. 392-395.