The Women in Art
This year, we’re continuing our focus on female artists. Our current Online Auction delves into art history from c. 1850 to 1950 and features works by a long list of talented artists who, despite great differences in style, theme, era and personality, have all beaten the challenges of being an artist who also happens to be a woman.
The fact that being a female artist has traditionally been such a rarity and so challenging testifies to the importance of focusing on the gender equality issue in the art world. This is something that the cultural institutions are currently doing, and at Bruun Rasmussen we can feel that our targeted focus has meant a markedly higher demand and rising hammer prices for a large number of female artists who have otherwise been all but written out of art history. At the current Online Auction in week 14 (W/C 4 April), we’re putting a string of works by representatives of both 19th and 20th century art under the hammer. In this article, our art experts Kathrine Eriksen, Camilla Bruun Stoltze and Sofie Normann Christensen have made a number of random picks from the selection.
The Front Runner Bertha WegmannThe auction features several works by Bertha Wegmann (1847–1926), including “Middagssøvn i det Grønne” (Afternoon nap outdoors) from 1883, where she gets surprisingly close to the motif in her portrayal of an elderly gentleman sleeping. Wegmann was one of the first women to work professionally as an artist in Denmark, where she was one of the leading portrait painters of her day, on a par with P.S. Krøyer. A member of the board of Tegne- og Kunstindustriskolen for Kvinder (Draftsmanship and Industrial Design School for Women), Wegmann worked actively to improve the conditions for women within the art world. She was also the first ever woman to be awarded a seat in the Danish Academy of Fine Arts’ Plenary Assembly and later became a member of the selection committee of Charlottenborg’s Spring Exhibition. Despite the success she enjoyed in her day and an impressive career, she slipped into oblivion. There has, however, been renewed interest in her at our auctions over the past year, and she is currently the subject of the exhibition “Bertha Wegmann. Painting in Many Languages” at the Hirschsprung Collection. |
Artist Sisters Ludovica and Emmy Thornam
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Sisters Ludovica Thornam (1853–96) and Emmy Thornam (1852–1935) also worked professionally as artists, and several of their works are up for auction. As the selection shows, Emmy Thornam specialised in flower painting, while portrait and figure painting were the focal points of Ludovica Thornam’s art, of which her evocative work “En Neapolitanerinde” (A Neapolitan Girl), which was exhibited at the Salon in Paris, is an excellent example. In 1887, the two sisters were awarded a three-year scholarship from the Danish Ministry of Culture, enabling them to travel together to the then art metropolises of Rome and Paris to further their education. On their return to Denmark, they were represented in a solo exhibition at art dealer Stochholm in Bredgade, which was unusual for women at the time. Despite having been successful artists in their day, they, too, were lost to posterity – until today, that is. |
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The Women’s Advocate, the Art Educator and the Artist with a Talent for the Performing arts
If we look further ahead in art history, there’s no getting away from Ebba Carstensen (1885–1967). She was one of the founders of KKS, the Danish Association of Women Artists, and, like Wegmann, she not only battled for her own recognition, but at the same time tried to improve the conditions for other female artists. Carstensen’s artistic work is impressive, with a wide range of motifs, but at the centre of it all is a rare sensuality and understanding of the material, as evidenced by her three paintings up for auction. We also have a beautiful still life by Bizzie Høyer (1888–1971) – a woman who very much shaped Danish art history. At her acclaimed art school, she prepared many of the later coryphaei for the Danish Academy of Fine Arts. Høyer’s own production is modest but nonetheless interesting. Her colourful still life of flowers, fruit and a book is remarkable for its absence of the colour black and the almost impressionistic construction of the motif, replete with nuances and contrasts.
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Another of modernism’s female artists is Besse Giersing (1896–1949), the daughter of artists Anna and Fritz Syberg. The creativity in her blood is undeniable, and in the space of her mere 48 years of life, she managed to mark herself as both a talented artist and actress. Giersing’s earliest paintings are largely motifs inspired by nature and the home, as seen in the work “Petunier” (Petunias) from 1916, which is up for auction. That same year she started as a student at Harald Giersing’s painting school, and it was here that her style shifted in a more modernist direction with semi-cubist elements and a stringent composition. |
Christine Swane and other Talented WomenThe painter Christine Swane (1876–1960) also came from an artistic family, and as the sister of Johannes Larsen, she was naturally included in a wider circle of progressive artists. Having initially adopted the naturalistic approach of the Fynbo painters, she later developed her own visual language, where her emphasis on the surface and discreet colouring gave her a distinctive and quiet mode of expression. The auction also features the art of many other female artists, including a bronze sculpture by Nielsine Petersen, fine works by Marie Luplau, Emilie Mundt, Elisabeth Jerichau Baumann and Agnes Slott-Møller, works on paper by Kamma Salto, Gerda Wegener, Ruth Smith and Else Fischer-Hansen, not to mention works by Else Alfelt and Sonia Delaunay, both of whom are the subject of current exhibitions. Also worth noting are a rare southern European motif with warm tones by Icelandic artist Júlíana Sveinsdóttir, a sunny garden by Elisabeth Karlinsky, a bouquet of flowers by Astrid Holm and a quivering still life by Anna Maria Lütken.
Feel free to explore all the works up for auction! |
For further information, please contact:
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Camilla Bruun StoltzeCamilla Bruun StoltzeSpecialist / 19th Century & Old Master Paintings / København |
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Sofie Normann ChristensenSofie Normann ChristensenSpecialist / 19th Century & Old Master Paintings / København |
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Kathrine EriksenKathrine EriksenSpecialist / Modern & Contemporary Art / København |
