Grez-sur-Loing - Arts and Relationships
Written by Fashion Tales16 februari - 18 augusti 2019
This spring's big exhibition at Waldemarsudde presents the mythical artist colony Grez-sur-Loing based on the latest research. In Grez, in the late 19th century, various relationships and relationships emerged between the artists of different nationalities who lived there and the fascinating works that they created in the village and its beautiful surroundings. More than 100 works by Scandinavian and Anglo-Saxon artists such as Karin and Carl Larsson, Julia Beck, Karl Nordström, Peder Severin Krøyer, Frank O'Meara, William Blair Bruce and Carolina Benedicks are shown in the exhibition.
A large number of artists, writers and musicians from different parts of the world met in Grez at the end of the 19th century. In the village they were inspired by each other both artistically and on a personal level. Socially, Grez served as a platform for artist communities, but also for friendship and love relationships within and across national borders. The latter include, for example, the marriage between William Blair Bruce and Carolina Benedicks as well as between Francis Brooks Chadwick and Emma Löwstädt. Despite the fact that the nation-wide connections have, the Grez colony in older Swedish art history writing, and in the exhibition context at home, has been described above all as a domestic affair. In the latter research which is highlighted in this exhibition, a completely different picture is drawn of how artists from different countries lived and acted in consensus side by side in the village.
The exhibition Grez-sur-Loing - Art and relations is the first of its kind in Sweden to describe the French village of Grez as an international meeting place for Swedish, other Scandinavian and Anglo-Saxon artists. The focus of the presentation is the many interesting works of art that were created in Grez from the late 1870s to the early 1890s. The exhibition contains over 100 works in different materials and techniques with motifs from the place and its beautiful surroundings. The bridge over the river Loing, the village's stone houses and gardens, the locals at work and friend portraits. The presentation also shows drawings from festivities such as masquerade and costume bales at Hôtel Chevillon and Pension Laurent. Among the artists who are represented can eg. include Karin Bergöö (married Larsson), Carl Larsson, Julia Beck, Emma Löwstädt-Chadwick, Hugo Birger, Karl Nordström, Carolina Benedicks-Bruce, Christian Krohg, Peder Severin Krøyer, Frank O'Meara, Katherine Mac Causland, Francis Brooks Chadwick and William Blair Bruce.
Grez-sur-Loing - Art and relations are part of Waldemarsudde's multi-year venture to highlight artist colonies as a phenomenon in the 19th century European art life. Earlier presentations at the museum have included the artist colony in Skagen in northern Jutland, the artist colony at Tyresö outside Stockholm and the Worpswede colony outside Bremen.
“It is a great pleasure for us at Waldemarsudde to, after the autumn's critically acclaimed exhibition on the Worpswede colony, now shed light on the fascinating international artist colony in the northern French village of Grez-sur-Loing. The extensive exhibition contains works from the late 1800s by both famous and currently forgotten artists of different nationalities. The female painters' situation in Grez, the social connections between the artists and the locals, and the colonial writers, including Strindberg and Robert Louis Stevenson, are highlighted in our rich, research-based presentation. The exhibition is unique of its kind and the first ever in Sweden to highlight the Grez colony as a meeting place for Swedish, other Scandinavian and Anglo-Saxon artists, writers and musicians in particular, ”says Karin Sidén, museum director and one of those responsible for the exhibition.
The exhibition is supplemented by an extensive catalog of articles by writers from England, Ireland, the USA, Norway and Sweden.
