Christ Daae Magelssen

Christ Daae Magelssen was a Norwegian sculptor .

Magelssen was son of parish priest in Åfjord Hans Gynter Magelssen (d. 1886) and Drude Cathrine Haar Daae (1815-88), a sister of Ludvig Kristensen Daa. As a young boy, he was first a sailor before he started making gallion figures in an English workshop. When he returned to Norway, he decided to become a sculptor, and went to Copenhagen in 1866 with a state grant. Here he was taught by the Danish sculptor Herman Wilhelm Bissen for three years. During this period, he performed his first major work, "Seaman, who sweeps his fathers' coast."

In the next few years, Magelssen lived in Kristiania before he went to Rome in 1871. Here he lived for ten years, initially with a state grant, and became acquainted with other Norwegians who were in Italy at the same time: Ole Bull, Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson, Jonas Lie and Henrik Ibsen. During the Roman period, he made the colossal statue "Meleager", which was exhibited at the World Exhibition in Paris in 1878. In the 1880s he returned to Norway, and lived first in Bergen then Kristiania.

Magelssen died at the age of 98. He was married to Italian letterpress daughter Adele Elvira Salandri (born 1857).