Gösta Adrian-Nilsson
Covered by droit de suite
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Harbor scene with boats
Signed GAN. Executed on the 1910s. Canvas laid on panel, 30 x 23.5 cm.
Provenance
Stockholms Auktionsverk, Moderna kvalitén, 30 October, 2008, cat. no. 594.
More information
When Gösta Adrian-Nilsson, at the age of 14 or 15, saw Marcus Larsson's painting "Sea in Moonlight with Lighthouse and Burning Steamboat" at the Academic Society in Lund, it was a powerful experience for him that later influenced his own creative work. "The spark of the lighthouse disappeared among other sparks, and there was no other salvation for the burning boat than to be crushed against the cliffs... But no painting in the world has CAUGHT me like that, which caught the thirteen-year-old in a breathless moment, when the boundaries of the room were erased and the boy himself became a flame in the flames from the burning steamboat in Marcus Larsson's painting." (GAN in Stockholms-Tidningen's Sunday supplement 19/12 1948)
During the second half of the 1910s, GAN's kaleidoscopic cubo-futurism reached its peak, and his legendary exhibition "Seafarer Compositions" the same year at Gummesons Art Gallery is a milestone in modern art history.
GAN was fascinated by the maritime world, both by sailors and by his hope of being a stowaway on a boat to South America or the South Seas - away from European civilization.
In his diary notes in September 1917, GAN writes that he acquired a model ship named "Elin," which adorned GAN's studio at Kungsbroplan until he moved from Stockholm at the end of May 1919.
In this painting, GAN has brought together different elements from the bustling harbor of the city: a sailboat rocks on the waves with its sails hoisted, the smoke from a steamboat rises in circular shapes towards the sky, and in the background, the city's high-rise buildings form a backdrop. Diagonals intersect throughout the entire composition, threatening to burst the frames. A symbolism of how GAN, in his artistic work, pushed the boundaries and paved the way for something completely new. The three primary colors, red, blue, and yellow, dramatically stand out against the more subdued gray tones, further filling the painting with a vibrant energy.