Branding the museum. An Analysis of the new National Museum in Oslo

This thesis analyzes the construction of The New National Museum in Oslo as a museum brand and investigates the process of branding within the institution. Branding and marketing approaches are becoming increasingly common within museum management, and many world-famous museums have decided to adopt branding strategies from other fields such as retail in order to answer to the continuous changes taking place in the cultural market. Oslo is one of those cities that in the past decade has undertaken a remarkable set of urban developments, among which was the construction of a new national museum. The consolidation of the previous national art museums in Oslo therefore required changes in the branding strategy and visual profile in order to redefine the museum ́s identity. In addition to looking into the process of branding at the National Museum in Oslo, this thesis also aims at understanding how the new brand has been perceived by the employees at the museum and how it has influenced their work. The last point of discussion of this dissertation is to find out how national identity is incorporated and presented within the new museum building and exhibitions