The View From Kobenhavn is a portrait of physicist/philosopher Niels Bohr (1883-1955). Born in Kobenhavn (Copenhagen), Denmark, Bohr became world famous for his contributions to atomic theory. He was one of the founders of modern quantum physics. Bohr's Copenhagen Interpretation of quantum mechanics remains the most widely accepted interpretation of quantum theory to this day.

One of the major implications of the Copenhagen interpretation is that we live in a viewer created reality. This means that if a tree falls in the forest, and no one is around to hear it, then it does not make a sound! Einstein, perhaps the most outspoken opponent of Bohr's interpretation, was quoted as saying "I believe that the moon is there, even when I am not looking!" My painting shows Bohr standing on Kobenhavn and, since the back side of the moon is not visible from Kobenhavn, it does not exist.

The coin which Bohr is flipping is in a superposition state. Shortly after being flipped the wave function describing the coin bifurcates into a superposition of the state "heads" and the state "tails." Until the coin lands and Bohr looks to see which side it is on, it is both heads and tails simultaneously. This is simmilar to the well known Schrödinger's Cat Paradox (written by Erwin Schrödinger, another famous opponent of Bohr's interpretation), where the cat is both dead and alive until you open the box and look inside.

If you look closely at the coin, you will see the phrase "Contraria Sunt Complimenta," meaning opposites which complement. Complementarity, another major component of the Copenhagen Interpretation, was originally used to explain the wave/particle duality of matter and light, but Bohr extended this idea, saying that everything in the universe and in life has a complement. The coin itself is a reproduction of the Niels Bohr medal given by the Danish Association of Engineers, and originally executed by H. Salomon.