Stockholm Archipelago, watercolour, Swedish painter Anna Gardel-Ericson

Anna Gardel-Ericson (SWE 1853-1939), watercolour depicting the Stockholm archipelago. Signed. Original frame with losses, beautiful patina. Painting: 24x35 cm. With frame: 30x43 cm. About the artist: Anna Gardel-Ericson began her artistic journey at a young age. At sixteen, she was sent to Switzerland to study piano, but she chose art. She studied at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Stockholm from 1872 to 1888, where she notably studied with Hilma af Klint. She exhibited at the academy in 1875 and 1877. She received a bronze medal at the Centennial International Exhibition of 1876 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. She continued her studies in Paris with Alexandre-Louis Leloir and Ferdinand Heilbuth in 1879. It was there that she studied and copied the French masters such as Camille Corot and Charles-François Daubigny, painting in watercolour. She exhibited at the Paris Salon in 1880 and again in 1882, her watercolour landscapes achieving great success and impressing her Swedish colleagues Carl Larsson and Anders Zorn. The Goupil Art Gallery signed a contract with her, paying 1000 francs per month for her watercolours. She was awarded at the Foreign Exhibition in Boston in 1883 and became a member of the British Dudley Gallery Art Society. Anna Gardel lived in France from 1879 to 1884 and married Johan Artistics in Paris in 1882, both of whom were already recognised artists. They settled in Gothenburg when a cholera epidemic broke out in Paris in 1884. In Sweden, she exhibited separately at Gummeson's Art Gallery in Stockholm in 1927 and participated in numerous exhibitions with the Swedish General Art Association and the Swedish Women Artists Association. Shortly before her death, she wrote her memoirs, but these were not published as a book. A commemorative exhibition was organised in Gothenburg in 1939, and Bukowski's auctions presented an exhibition of Gardel-Ericson's watercolours in 1946. To mark the 100th anniversary of the marriage of the two couples, Gotlands Fornsal and Gotlands Konstmuseum organised a commemorative exhibition in Visby in 1982, which was later moved to Gothenburg and Börjesson's Art Gallery. A commemorative book on the life and work of the artist couple was also published in 1982. It is based on complete access to all letters and memoirs, many of which had never been published before. The book contains paintings from, among others, many art museums, the A&M collections of the King and the Swedish Parliament, which have been reproduced in large format, high-quality colour. Gardel is represented at the Nationalmuseum, the Gothenburg Art Museum, the Norrköping Art Museum, and in several museums around the world.