Early life
Mortensen was born in New York City, New York. His American mother, Grace Gamble (née Atkinson), and Danish father, Viggo Peter Mortensen, Sr. (a farm manager who worked in business), met in Norway. His maternal grandfather was Canadian. His family moved to Venezuela, Argentina and Denmark, settling in Argentina, where he learned Spanish. His father managed chicken farms and ranches in Argentina. They remained there until Mortensen was age eleven, when his parents divorced and his mother moved back to New York. He moved with his father to Copenhagen, Denmark. Mortensen and his father eventually went back to the United States where Mortensen graduated from Watertown High School, Watertown, New York. After high school, he returned to Denmark, and became a truckdriver in Esbjerg, Denmark, before, again, returning to the United States to pursue an acting career. He attended St. Lawrence University in Canton, New York, earning a bachelor's degree in Spanish. He chose that subject becaus
More about Viggo Mortensen (From Wikipedia)
Early Life
Mortensen was born in New York City, New York. His American mother, Grace Gamble (née Atkinson), and Danish father, Viggo Peter Mortensen, Sr. (a farm manager who worked in business), read more...
Acting Career
After several years of experience in live theater, Mortensen made his first movie appearance playing an Amish farmer in Peter Weir's Witness. (Mortensen had actually acted in two read more...
Perceval Press
With part of his earnings from The Lord of the Rings, Mortensen founded the Perceval Press publishing house — named for the knight from the legend of King Arthur — read more...
Bibliography
Mortensen is also an author, with various books of poetry, photography and painting published. His bibliography includes:
read more...Visual Arts And Discography
Mortensen is a painter and photographer. His paintings are frequently abstract, and often contain fragments of his poetry in them. His paintings have been featured in galleries worldwide, read more...
Personal Life
Mortensen has a son, Henry Mortensen, with ex-wife Exene Cervenka, singer of the punk band X. Henry and Viggo have done public father/son poetry reading together as recently as April read more...
Viggo Peter Mortensen, Jr. (born October 20, 1958) is a Golden Globe- and Academy Award-nominated Swedish American theater and movie actor, poet, musician, photographer and painter.
He read more...