In 1995 Norway’s only national photographic museum, Preus Museum, was established. In 2001 the museum opened in new premises in Horten outside of Oslo. It is owned by the Norwegian state and has overall responsibility for the preservation, collection and dissemination of photographs in Norway, with a particular focus on artistic photographs.

In 1995 photographic art was incorporated in the Norwegian copyright act. It was not until 2004, however, that the Norwegian Ministry of Finance removed the VAT on photographic art in order for it to be recognised on the same premises as painting and sculpture. This gives evidence to the slow birth photography has had in Norway, compared to other art forms. While staged, digitally manipulated photography dominated Norwegian photographic art in the 1990s, with executants such as Tandberg, McAlinden and Ole John Aandal, a so-called new-realism, characterised by a more documentary tendency, has dominated the 2000s. At the start of the 21st century Norwegian photographic art could generally be characterised by a move from the private room dominating in the 1990s towards a more social, urban or architectural setting where the dialogue between nature and culture, as an example, has been important. Here photographers such as Marte Aas, Anne-Grethe Thoresen, Eline Mugaas, Mette Tronvoll, Hedvig Anker, Dag Nordbrenden, Marius Engh and Torbjørn Rødland can be mentioned. See http://www.fotogalleriet.no for further information on Norwegian photography