Peder Severin Krøyer
Encyclopedia
Peder Severin Krøyer known as P.S. Krøyer, was a Norwegian
-Danish
painter. He is one of the best known and beloved, and undeniably the most colorful of the Skagen Painters
, a community of Danish and Nordic artists who lived, gathered or worked in Skagen
, Denmark, especially during the final decades of the 19th century. Krøyer was the unofficial leader of the group.
, Norway
on 23 July 1851 to Ellen Cecilie Gjesdal. He was raised by Gjesdal's sister, Bertha Cecilie (born 1817) and brother-in-law, the Danish zoologist Henrik Nikolai Krøyer, after his mother was judged unfit to care for him. Krøyer moved to Copenhagen
to live with his foster parents soon afterward. Having begun his art education at the age of nine under private tutelage, he was enrolled in Copenhagen's Technical Institute the following year.
In 1870 at the age of 19 Krøyer completed his studies at the Royal Danish Academy of Art
(Det Kongelige Danske Kunstakademi), where he had studied with Frederik Vermehren
. In 1873 he was awarded the gold medal, as well as a scholarship.
His official debut as a painter was in 1871 at Charlottenborg
with a portrait of a friend, painter Frans Schwartz. He exhibited regularly at Charlottenborg throughout his life.
In 1874 Heinrich Hirschsprung
bought his first painting from Krøyer, establishing a long-standing patronage. Hirschsprung's collection of art forms the basis of the Hirschsprung Museum in Copenhagen.
, meeting artists, studying art, and developing his skills and outlook. He stayed in Paris
and studied under Léon Bonnat
, and undoubtedly came under the influence of contemporary impressionists
-- Claude Monet
, Alfred Sisley
, Edgar Degas
, Pierre-Auguste Renoir
and Edouard Manet
.
He continued to travel throughout his life, constantly drawing inspiration from foreign artists and cultures. Hirschsprung provided financial support during the early travels, and Krøyer continued exhibiting in Denmark throughout this period.
In 1882 he returned to Denmark. He spent June–October at Skagen, then a remote fishing village on the northern tip of Denmark, painting themes from local life, as well as depictions of the artistic community there. He would continue to be associated with the developing art and literary scene at Skagen. Other artists at Skagen included writers Holger Drachmann
, Georg Brandes
, and Henrik Pontoppidan
, and artists Michael Ancher
and Anna Ancher
.
Krøyer divided his time between rented houses in Skagen during the summer, a winter apartment in Copenhagen where he worked on his large commissioned portraits, and travel outside of the country.
in 1888 he ran into Marie Martha Mathilde Triepcke
, whom he had known in Copenhagen. They fell in love and, after a whirlwind romance, married on 23 July 1889 at her parents' home in Germany
. Marie Krøyer, who was also a painter, became associated with the Skagen community, and after their marriage was often featured in Krøyer's paintings. The couple had one child, a daughter named Vibeke, born in January, 1895. They were divorced in 1905 following a prolonged separation.
Krøyer died in 1909 at 58 years of age after years of declining health caused by advanced syphilis
. He had also been in and out of hospital
s, suffering from bouts of mental illness.
His eyesight failed him gradually over the last ten years of his life until he was totally blind. Ever the optimist, Krøyer painted almost to the end, in spite of health obstacles. In fact, he painted some of his last masterpieces while half-blind, joking that the eyesight in his one working eye had become better with the loss of the other eye.
and Marie Krøyer" (Sommeraften ved Skagen Sønderstrand med Anna Ancher og Marie Krøyer), 1893. He painted many beach scenes featuring both recreation life on the beach (bathers, strollers), and local fishermen.
Another well-loved work is "Saint John's Eve Bonfire on Skagen's Beach" (Sankthansbål på Skagen strand), 1903. This large-scale work features a great crowd of the artistic and influential Skagen community gathered around a large bonfire on the beach on Saint John's Eve (Midsummer Eve
).
Both of these works are in the permanent collection of the Skagens Museum which is dedicated to that community of artists, including those who gathered around Krøyer, a great organizer and bon vivant.
Norway
Norway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic unitary constitutional monarchy whose territory comprises the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula, Jan Mayen, and the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard and Bouvet Island. Norway has a total area of and a population of about 4.9 million...
-Danish
Denmark
Denmark is a Scandinavian country in Northern Europe. The countries of Denmark and Greenland, as well as the Faroe Islands, constitute the Kingdom of Denmark . It is the southernmost of the Nordic countries, southwest of Sweden and south of Norway, and bordered to the south by Germany. Denmark...
painter. He is one of the best known and beloved, and undeniably the most colorful of the Skagen Painters
Skagen Painters
The Skagen Painters were a group of Scandinavian artists who gathered in the area of Skagen, the northernmost part of Denmark, from the late 1870s until the turn of the century...
, a community of Danish and Nordic artists who lived, gathered or worked in Skagen
Skagen
Skagen is a projection of land and a town, with a population of 8,515 , in Region Nordjylland on the northernmost tip of Vendsyssel-Thy, a part of the Jutland peninsula in northern Denmark...
, Denmark, especially during the final decades of the 19th century. Krøyer was the unofficial leader of the group.
Growing up and early training
Krøyer was born in StavangerStavanger
Stavanger is a city and municipality in the county of Rogaland, Norway.Stavanger municipality has a population of 126,469. There are 197,852 people living in the Stavanger conurbation, making Stavanger the fourth largest city, but the third largest urban area, in Norway...
, Norway
Norway
Norway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic unitary constitutional monarchy whose territory comprises the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula, Jan Mayen, and the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard and Bouvet Island. Norway has a total area of and a population of about 4.9 million...
on 23 July 1851 to Ellen Cecilie Gjesdal. He was raised by Gjesdal's sister, Bertha Cecilie (born 1817) and brother-in-law, the Danish zoologist Henrik Nikolai Krøyer, after his mother was judged unfit to care for him. Krøyer moved to Copenhagen
Copenhagen
Copenhagen is the capital and largest city of Denmark, with an urban population of 1,199,224 and a metropolitan population of 1,930,260 . With the completion of the transnational Øresund Bridge in 2000, Copenhagen has become the centre of the increasingly integrating Øresund Region...
to live with his foster parents soon afterward. Having begun his art education at the age of nine under private tutelage, he was enrolled in Copenhagen's Technical Institute the following year.
In 1870 at the age of 19 Krøyer completed his studies at the Royal Danish Academy of Art
Royal Danish Academy of Art
The Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts has provided a practice-oriented complement to the scholarly investigation of the arts carried out at Danish universities for more than 250 years, playing a crucial part in the development of the distinctive tradition of the art of Denmark.- History :The Royal...
(Det Kongelige Danske Kunstakademi), where he had studied with Frederik Vermehren
Frederik Vermehren
Johan Frederik Nikolai Vermehren, also known as Frederik Vermehren, , Danish realistic genre and portrait painter, was born in Ringsted to glazier Peter Frederik Nikolai Vermehren and his wife Sofie Amalie. His artistic career took place during the period of Danish art between the Golden Age of...
. In 1873 he was awarded the gold medal, as well as a scholarship.
Early career
Charlottenborg Palace
Charlottenborg Palace is a large town mansion located on the corner of Kongens Nytorv and Nyhavn in Copenhagen, Denmark. Originally built as a residence for Ulrik Frederik Gyldenløve, it has served as the base of the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts since its foundation in 1754...
with a portrait of a friend, painter Frans Schwartz. He exhibited regularly at Charlottenborg throughout his life.
In 1874 Heinrich Hirschsprung
Heinrich Hirschsprung
Heinrich Hirschsprung was a Danish tobacco manufacturer, arts patron and art collector, founder of the Hirschsprung Collection in Copenhagen, a museum dedicated to Danish art from the 19th and early 20th century....
bought his first painting from Krøyer, establishing a long-standing patronage. Hirschsprung's collection of art forms the basis of the Hirschsprung Museum in Copenhagen.
Travels
Between 1877-1881, Krøyer travelled extensively in EuropeEurope
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
, meeting artists, studying art, and developing his skills and outlook. He stayed in Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
and studied under Léon Bonnat
Léon Bonnat
Léon Joseph Florentin Bonnat was a French painter.He was born in Bayonne, but from 1846 to 1853 he lived in Madrid, where his father owned a bookshop. While tending his father's shop, he copied engravings of works by the Old Masters, developing a passion for drawing...
, and undoubtedly came under the influence of contemporary impressionists
Impressionism
Impressionism was a 19th-century art movement that originated with a group of Paris-based artists whose independent exhibitions brought them to prominence during the 1870s and 1880s...
-- Claude Monet
Claude Monet
Claude Monet was a founder of French impressionist painting, and the most consistent and prolific practitioner of the movement's philosophy of expressing one's perceptions before nature, especially as applied to plein-air landscape painting. . Retrieved 6 January 2007...
, Alfred Sisley
Alfred Sisley
Alfred Sisley was an Impressionist landscape painter who was born and spent most of his life, in France, but retained British citizenship. He was the most consistent of the Impressionists in his dedication to painting landscape en plein air...
, Edgar Degas
Edgar Degas
Edgar Degas[p] , born Hilaire-Germain-Edgar De Gas, was a French artist famous for his work in painting, sculpture, printmaking and drawing. He is regarded as one of the founders of Impressionism although he rejected the term, and preferred to be called a realist...
, Pierre-Auguste Renoir
Pierre-Auguste Renoir
Pierre-Auguste Renoir was a French artist who was a leading painter in the development of the Impressionist style. As a celebrator of beauty, and especially feminine sensuality, it has been said that "Renoir is the final representative of a tradition which runs directly from Rubens to...
and Edouard Manet
Édouard Manet
Édouard Manet was a French painter. One of the first 19th-century artists to approach modern-life subjects, he was a pivotal figure in the transition from Realism to Impressionism....
.
He continued to travel throughout his life, constantly drawing inspiration from foreign artists and cultures. Hirschsprung provided financial support during the early travels, and Krøyer continued exhibiting in Denmark throughout this period.
Krøyer comes to Skagen
Holger Drachmann
Holger Henrik Herholdt Drachmann , was a Danish poet and dramatist. He is an outstanding figure of the Modern Break-Through....
, Georg Brandes
Georg Brandes
Georg Morris Cohen Brandes was a Danish critic and scholar who had great influence on Scandinavian and European literature from the 1870s through the turn of the 20th century. He is seen as the theorist behind the "Modern Breakthrough" of Scandinavian culture...
, and Henrik Pontoppidan
Henrik Pontoppidan
Henrik Pontoppidan was a realist writer who shared with Karl Gjellerup the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1917 for "his authentic descriptions of present-day life in Denmark." Pontoppidan's novels and short stories — informed with a desire for social progress but despairing, later in his...
, and artists Michael Ancher
Michael Peter Ancher
Michael Peter Ancher was a Danish impressionist artist. He is most associated with his paintings of fishermen and other scenes from the Danish port of Skagen. His paintings are classics and he is probably one of Denmark's most popular artists.-Background:Michael Peter Ancher was born at Rutsker on...
and Anna Ancher
Anna Ancher
Anna Ancher was a Danish artist associated with the Skagen Painters, an artists' colony in the very north of Jutland.-Background:...
.
Krøyer divided his time between rented houses in Skagen during the summer, a winter apartment in Copenhagen where he worked on his large commissioned portraits, and travel outside of the country.
Krøyer and Marie
On a trip to ParisParis
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
in 1888 he ran into Marie Martha Mathilde Triepcke
Marie Triepcke Krøyer Alfvén
Marie Triepcke Krøyer Alfvén , commonly known as Marie Krøyer, was a famous Danish painter. She was born Maria Martha Mathilde Triepcke in Frederiksberg, Denmark to Wilhelm August Eduard Max and Minna Augusta Kindler Triepcke, who had immigrated to Denmark from Germany the previous year. Max...
, whom he had known in Copenhagen. They fell in love and, after a whirlwind romance, married on 23 July 1889 at her parents' home in Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
. Marie Krøyer, who was also a painter, became associated with the Skagen community, and after their marriage was often featured in Krøyer's paintings. The couple had one child, a daughter named Vibeke, born in January, 1895. They were divorced in 1905 following a prolonged separation.
Krøyer died in 1909 at 58 years of age after years of declining health caused by advanced syphilis
Syphilis
Syphilis is a sexually transmitted infection caused by the spirochete bacterium Treponema pallidum subspecies pallidum. The primary route of transmission is through sexual contact; however, it may also be transmitted from mother to fetus during pregnancy or at birth, resulting in congenital syphilis...
. He had also been in and out of hospital
Hospital
A hospital is a health care institution providing patient treatment by specialized staff and equipment. Hospitals often, but not always, provide for inpatient care or longer-term patient stays....
s, suffering from bouts of mental illness.
His eyesight failed him gradually over the last ten years of his life until he was totally blind. Ever the optimist, Krøyer painted almost to the end, in spite of health obstacles. In fact, he painted some of his last masterpieces while half-blind, joking that the eyesight in his one working eye had become better with the loss of the other eye.
Works
Krøyer's best known and best-loved work is entitled "Summer Evening on Skagen's Southern Beach with Anna AncherAnna Ancher
Anna Ancher was a Danish artist associated with the Skagen Painters, an artists' colony in the very north of Jutland.-Background:...
and Marie Krøyer" (Sommeraften ved Skagen Sønderstrand med Anna Ancher og Marie Krøyer), 1893. He painted many beach scenes featuring both recreation life on the beach (bathers, strollers), and local fishermen.
Another well-loved work is "Saint John's Eve Bonfire on Skagen's Beach" (Sankthansbål på Skagen strand), 1903. This large-scale work features a great crowd of the artistic and influential Skagen community gathered around a large bonfire on the beach on Saint John's Eve (Midsummer Eve
Midsummer
Midsummer may simply refer to the period of time centered upon the summer solstice, but more often refers to specific European celebrations that accompany the actual solstice, or that take place on a day between June 21 and June 24, and the preceding evening. The exact dates vary between different...
).
Both of these works are in the permanent collection of the Skagens Museum which is dedicated to that community of artists, including those who gathered around Krøyer, a great organizer and bon vivant.
External links
- Skagens Museum
- P.S. Krøyer in Hirschsprungske Samling
- A good selection of his paintings shown as thumbnails, but which can be enlarged (dead page?)
- Another selection of his paintings
- Google celebrated Peder Severin Krøyer's 159th Birthday with special logotype