Everyone has a passion project that they would happily work on for years to come. In the case of Norwegian sovereign wealth fund CEO Nicolai Tangen, it’s his art collection.
This isn’t just any collection. Tangen, responsible for $1.6 trillion in investments at Norges Bank Investment Management, owns more than 5,000 works of art, which he has chosen to house in a century-old grain silo located in the southern town of Kristiansand.
The exhibition, called Kristiansand Kunstsilo, features various Norwegian artists and is worth $46 million, but it is not meant to be simply a window into Tangen’s artistic interests. Its goal is to attract more tourists to the city and, one day, compete with other Norwegian museums.
“I think they are developing an interest in Nordic art,” Tangen told Bloomberg, referring to international visitors. “I hope this will increase competition in the museum world in Norway. I would love it to be like an irritating little mosquito, which organizes the best exhibitions, so that people in Oslo say: “What the hell is happening in this city?” »
The CEO of Norges Bank has been collecting art for almost 35 years. In choosing his art, Tangen follows the advice he gives to the fund’s traders: think against the grain. Instead of buying newer works of art that come onto the market, he buys works more than 50 years old to see their store of value over time.
Kunstsilo, which once housed 15,000 tons of grain, is now the gallery with the world’s most comprehensive collection of Nordic modern art.
“It was always meant to be a museum-type collection, meaning you want to have the most important artists and the most important works,” Tangen said.
Tangen’s podcasting side gig
CEOs are often thought to be too busy for anything other than business. But their interests outside of work have recently made headlines. Consider David Solomon of Goldman Sachs love for DJing or Mark Zuckerberg’s penchant for mixed martial arts.
Like its counterparts, Tangen also has many interests.
If managing the world’s largest sovereign wealth fund and collecting modern art weren’t enough to occupy his time, Tangen has another side job involving senior business executives: he hosts a weekly podcast with them.
He interviews some of the world’s most influential CEOs, from Tesla’s Elon Musk to Santander’s Ana Botin, covering personal and professional topics. Title In good companythe podcast was Tangen’s pandemic baby.
By serving auditors “a bit of their secret sauce,” the Norges Bank chief aims to make the fund as transparent as possible, he said in an interview with Wall Street Journal last month.
Tangen’s love for art is perhaps just another way to connect with people and introduce them to Norwegian culture.
