The Danish landscape with its fields of yellow and green
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“What I, as a painter, have set as my life’s goal is: to paint dear Denmark, but with all the simplicity and modesty that is so characteristic of it; what beauty is there not in these fine lines of our hills, which are so charmingly undulating that they appear to have risen from the sea, in the mighty sea, the shores by which the steep yellow cliffs stand, in our forests, fields and moors?” (Journal entry, 24 March 1842) Johan Thomas Lundbye is one of the most important painters of the Danish Golden Age. He specialised in landscape painting, and he followed the national romantic line, defined by the art historian N.L. Høyen, among others, who wanted to use art to rebuild a national identity and patriotism at a time when Denmark had suffered major defeats. Lundbye was also a highly skilled animal painter, known for his very detailed and precise close-up studies of animals, especially cows. Lundbye was tutored privately by the animal painter Christian Holm and attended the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts in Copenhagen from 1832–42, where he received tuition from the landscape painter J.L. Lund, among others. Having been awarded the Academy’s travel grant in 1845, Lundbye set off across Europe to Rome, where he lived with his artist friends Jens Adolf Jerichau and Thorald Læssøe. However, his time in Italy was marked by fierce disagreements between him and his two roommates, and as a result of intense homesickness and a longing for his homeland, he was already back in Denmark the following year. Lundbye’s favourite motif was the Danish landscape with its fields of yellow and green, rolling hills, endless stretches of coast and monuments of the past. His motifs are not topographically accurate depiction, but often a reproduction of the idealized Danish nature. It was primarily the Zealand landscape that interested him. He often visited the area around Frederiksværk in North Zealand, and he spent several summers in the area around Vognserup Manor near Holbæk, where he found some of his best-known motifs. Lundbye was a diligent writer of letters and an ardent journal keeper, and his many preserved journals provide an insight into the artist’s reflections on faith, art and love. Lundbye volunteered for military service in the First Schleswig War but lost his life after just a few days at the age of 29, killed by a stray bullet in Southern Jutland. |
