Passersby Rescue Artworks from Copenhagen’s Burning Bourse

Staff, emergency workers, and shocked bystanders braved the towering flames that consumed Copenhagen’s iconic seventeenth-century former stock exchange on April 16 to carry historic paintings to safety. The fire, which was reported at about 7:30 a.m. local time, according toThe Guardian, broke out as the 1625 building was undergoing restoration. The scaffolding surrounding the bourse made battling the blaze difficult; the problem was compounded by the structure’s copper roof, which trapped the heat on the inside and sent water sluicing off externally, necessitating its removal in sections so that firefighters could train their hoses on the interior.

Despite these conditions, which resulted in the collapse of the building’s extraordinary spire comprising four stone dragons with tails intertwined, many risked life and limb to retrieve their country’s heritage from the conflagration, with one manreportedto have jumped off his bicycle to enter the inferno. “How touching it is to see how the employees at Børsen, good people from the emergency services and passersby work together to rescue art treasures and iconic images from the burning building,” wrote Danish culture minister Jakob Engel-Schmidtin a post on X. Though many works had been evacuated from the building ahead of the renovation, Engel-Schmidt confirmed to the BBC that four centuries of national history had been lost in the blaze.

Among the paintings saved was a well-known 1895 canvas by Peder Severin (P. S.) Krøyer titled From Copenhagen Stock Exchange and depicting a group of Danish businessmen inside the bourse itself; so colossal is the canvas that it took several people to hustle it to safety. Apart from the artworks, some of which dated back to the 1600s, many pieces of historic furniture were saved as well.

“We have been able to rescue a lot,” a visibly emotional Brian Mikkelsen, chief of the Danish Chamber of Commerce, told the AP, characterizing the loss of the much-loved building as “a national disaster.”