This early 20th-century oil painting by Danish artist Bertel Hansen-Svaneke (1883-1937) depicts an interior with chest of drawers, chair and gilt-framed artworks.
Hansen-Svaneke treasured introspective moments of quiet solitude. When silence is punctuated only by the reassuring monotony of an inherited grandfather clock. His interiors are subtle, at times melancholy, as if we’re sitting alongside him while he sketches in a dog-eared notebook. Oblivious of our company.
This unusual gently-lit corner, where a white chest proudly dominates, feels like a place he knows. Perhaps it’s his own home, a voyeuristic window into his world. A door he travels through, a chair he drapes his tired smock.
He’s observing the light and little else as it falls across the decor. The paintings barely visible, the ornaments glinting with suggestion.
Signed and held within a gilt frame.
Medium: Oil on canvas
Overall size: 26½” x 22½” / 67cm x 57cm
Year of creation: c. 1930
Provenance: Private collection, Denmark.
Condition: Artwork presents well. Fine craquelure but the paint is stable. Frame with some light wear.
Artist’s auction maximum: £4,066
Bertel Hansen-Svaneke was an academy-trained Danish painter of landscapes, interior scenes, portraits and figures. He trained initially under the eminent Gustav Vermehren and later at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts. His works are wholeheartedly traditional and represent a conservative view of Danish rural life. The Bornholm Art Museum holds numerous examples.
Learn more about Bertel Hansen-Svaneke in our directory.
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