This beautiful early 20th-century oil painting by Danish artist Alfred Broge (1870-1955) depicts a lady seated by a dressing table.

Amid the solitude of a hushed environment, she rests in contemplation. Yellow blooms sit adjacent to a half-burnt candle, a portrait of a woman hangs proudly in gilt, an oval dressing mirror displays a vertical glimpse of light. It’s innocuous but somehow poignant. Broge was a master of such scenes, capturing passing moments with dextrous handling. Note the dabs of light on the pointed shoe and the skilful rendering of the loose brown dress.

Born in Copenhagen, Broge trained at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts under Rudolph Bissen (1846-1911) before exhibiting widely, including at the prestigious Charlottenborg Spring Exhibition.

Signed in the lower left and held in a later gilt frame.

Learn more about Alfred Broge in our directory.

Medium: Oil on canvas
Overall size: 21½” x 25” / 55cm x 64cm
Year of creation: c. 1920
Provenance: With Hubert Faure (1919-2020), Piccadilly, London / Private collection, UK.
Condition: Cleaned. Frame in good condition with minor age-related wear.
Artist’s auction maximum: £11,000 for ‘A Young Fishergirl (1919)’, Oil on canvas, Sotheby’s, 19th And 20th Century Scandinavian Paintings, Watercolours And Sculpture, London, 1990 (lot 170).
Our reference: BRV1991