Vilhelm Hammershøi: The artist's sister Anna Hammershøi. Unsigned.

lot/vilhelm hammershoi the artist s sister anna hammershoi unsigned WVx6fdw 632609080 / For sale

lot/vilhelm hammershoi the artist s sister anna hammershoi unsigned WVx6fdw 632609080

For salePrice history

lot/vilhelm hammershoi the artist s sister anna hammershoi unsigned WVx6fdw 632609080

For salePrice history

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Vilhelm Hammershøi: The artist's sister Anna Hammershøi. Unsigned.

The artist’s sister Anna Hammershøi, seen from behind, with her head slightly turned to the right. Mid-1880s. Unsigned. Authenticated on the reverse by the artist’s wife, Ida Hammershøi: "Malt af Vilh. Hammershøi, attesteres: Ida Hammershøi" (Painted by Vilh. Hammershøi, certified: Ida Hammershøi). Oil on canvas laid down on panel. 38 x 28 cm. The present work belongs to a group of paintings and drawings from the mid-1880s in which Hammershøi’s sister, Anna Hammershøi (1866-1956), appears as the artist’s model. This was a significant and early period in Hammershøi’s development, during which he experimented with many of the pictorial means that would later become so characteristic of his art. The series includes, among others, the artist’s debut work "Portrait of a Young Woman. Anna Hammershøi", exhibited at Charlottenborg in 1885 and today in the Hirschsprung Collection, as well as "Young Girl Sewing. Anna Hammershøi" from 1887, today in the Ordrupgaard Collection. The latter work was rejected by the Charlottenborg jury in 1888. The rejection became a significant expression of the conflict between the established exhibition system and the younger generation of artists, which led to the founding of Den Frie Udstilling in 1891. Hammershøi remained one of Den Frie’s central artists and exhibited there until his death in 1916. Anna was also photographed in the years around 1885–1888 by Hammershøi’s close friend and fellow artist Valdemar Schønheyder Møller (1864–1905). Considered alongside Hammershøi’s paintings from the same period, these photographs reveal a close connection in the ways in which photography and painting crop, isolate and closely study the young female figure. This connection has also been highlighted by Annette Rosenvoldt Hvidt and Gertrud Oelsner in ”Vilhelm Hammershøi – på sporet af det åbne værk” from 2018 and by the Hirschsprung Collection in connection with the 2021 exhibition ”Fremkaldelser. Vilhelm Hammershøi, Valdemar Schønheyder Møller og fotografiet”. Rosenvold Hvidt and Oelsner describe this connection as follows (in Danish): ”Both artists work intensely with close-ups of Anna during the period from 1885 to 1888, and if one considers the images as a coherent group, it is as if one is stepping into the same room. The soft light falling diagonally from above onto Anna’s face is a central theme for both Schønheyder Møller and Hammershøi. It is not a spiritual aura that the artists evoke around the young woman, but a seductive light that envelops her. The images concentrate in sensuously charged close-ups on the human figure and invite us to linger on the face, the hair, the skin, the light and the paint. The motifs appear as a form of indirect physical touches.” (p. 140). This is also a very precise description of what takes place in this small yet intensely concentrated painting. The light falls upon Anna from above and slightly from the front, modelling the contours of her right profile. The translucent skin of her earlobe is illuminated from within, while highlights catch the tightly arranged dark hair. The characteristic bun at the nape of her neck emerges through a refined interplay of black-brown tones and a few lighter strokes. Her left shoulder forms a softly undulating contour, defined by the backlighting and continuing beyond the left edge of the picture.

Estimate:£171,717

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