DOI issue:
No. 323 (February 1920)
DOI article:Wåhlin, Karl: Carl Larsson
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.21359#0196
CARL LARSSON
"THE STUDY CORNER”
BY CARL LARSSON
(In the collection of Carl
Piltz, Esq., Stockholm)
art collector and diplomatist, Carl Gustaf
Tessin, just back from Paris, while genii
floating in the air above her head bear
Boucher's The Triumph of Galathea, the
costliest treasure of the Tessin collec-
tions ; here King Gustavus III, with a
theatrical gesture of admiration and hom-
age, receives at the palace of Stockholm
those antique marbles that he had brought
home from his Italian journey; here,
finally, Sergei chisels his Amor and Psyche,
while his friend the poet Bellman sings a
pastoral to his lute. All this is given in a
style equally firm and simple ; and as a
manifestation of strongly personal, richly
expressive art, it takes a prominent place
among all the monumental painting which,
during the latter half of the nineteenth
century, was brought to light in Europe.
The new buildings for the Opera and
the Dramatic Theatre in Stockholm also
190
secured large decorative paintings from his
hand. Here he entered upon those techni-
cally difficult problems which are raised
by the painting of ceilings, and he solved
them adroitly and brilliantly. 0 0
When Larsson had lived in Stockholm
for ten years he had had enough of the
capital, where his amiable and convivial
personality was sought after in a way that
cut too much into his working hours.
He moved to the simple little cottage in the
village of Sundborn, that for the rest of his
life became the subject of his untiring care
and thus was transformed into the ideal
Swedish homestead that kindly and in-
vitingly beams towards us from innumer-
able water-colours of his hand. These,
however, have very little in common with
the soft and subtle paintings in water-
colour of the French epoch. Larsson had
learnt to rely more and more on the line as
"THE STUDY CORNER”
BY CARL LARSSON
(In the collection of Carl
Piltz, Esq., Stockholm)
art collector and diplomatist, Carl Gustaf
Tessin, just back from Paris, while genii
floating in the air above her head bear
Boucher's The Triumph of Galathea, the
costliest treasure of the Tessin collec-
tions ; here King Gustavus III, with a
theatrical gesture of admiration and hom-
age, receives at the palace of Stockholm
those antique marbles that he had brought
home from his Italian journey; here,
finally, Sergei chisels his Amor and Psyche,
while his friend the poet Bellman sings a
pastoral to his lute. All this is given in a
style equally firm and simple ; and as a
manifestation of strongly personal, richly
expressive art, it takes a prominent place
among all the monumental painting which,
during the latter half of the nineteenth
century, was brought to light in Europe.
The new buildings for the Opera and
the Dramatic Theatre in Stockholm also
190
secured large decorative paintings from his
hand. Here he entered upon those techni-
cally difficult problems which are raised
by the painting of ceilings, and he solved
them adroitly and brilliantly. 0 0
When Larsson had lived in Stockholm
for ten years he had had enough of the
capital, where his amiable and convivial
personality was sought after in a way that
cut too much into his working hours.
He moved to the simple little cottage in the
village of Sundborn, that for the rest of his
life became the subject of his untiring care
and thus was transformed into the ideal
Swedish homestead that kindly and in-
vitingly beams towards us from innumer-
able water-colours of his hand. These,
however, have very little in common with
the soft and subtle paintings in water-
colour of the French epoch. Larsson had
learnt to rely more and more on the line as