Winter Landscape
Gustaf Edolf Fjaestad
(Swedish, 1868–1948)
1908
Medium/TechniqueOil on canvas
Dimensions135 x 148 cm (53 1/8 x 58 1/4 in.)
Credit LineTompkins Collection—Arthur Gordon Tompkins Fund and M. Theresa B. Hopkins Fund
Accession number2014.888
On View
Not on viewClassificationsPaintings
Collections
Fjaestad made a specialty of painting the Nordic landscape. Though his choice of subject was resolutely local, his style reflects his awareness of major pan-European trends in the visual arts. The sinuous lines of the snow-laden branches recall the formal vocabulary of Art Nouveau, while the broad patches of color are Fjaestad’s personal, decorative take on Pointillism. The artist described winter as “ruled by a pure and quiet spirit,” made manifest here through the limited color palette and tightly-cropped viewpoint.
Provenance1910 and 1911, exhibited by the artist [see note 1]. 2012, private collection, Austria; December 7, 2012, anonymous sale (consigned from an Austrian private collection), Hauswedell und Nolte, Hamburg, lot 265. November 20, 2013, anonymous sale, Sotheby’s, London, lot 81, to Jack Kilgore, Inc., London; 2014, sold by Jack Kilgore to the MFA. (Accession Date: June 25, 2014)
NOTES:
[1] Included in an exhibition of Swedish art at the Leipziger Kunstverein, 1910, cat. no. 6536 and in the Swedish pavilion of the International Art Exhibition, Rome, 1911, cat. no. 1686.
NOTES:
[1] Included in an exhibition of Swedish art at the Leipziger Kunstverein, 1910, cat. no. 6536 and in the Swedish pavilion of the International Art Exhibition, Rome, 1911, cat. no. 1686.
Gerrit Willem Dijsselhof
Barbara Longhi
Jacob Adriaensz. Backer
Unidentified artist, Belgian, fourth quarter 18th century