Anna Ancher: Mistress of interior Light and Color

Anna Ancher - Sunlight in the Blue Room. Helga Ancher Knitting in her Grandmother's Room - 1891 - Oil on canvas, 65 x 59 cm - Skagens Museum, Skagen (click photo for larger image)Around 1870, growing numbers of Scandinavian artists took to visiting Paris, the modern metropolis with its many-sided art scene. When summer arrived the artists deserted the city. The coast of Brittany was especially popular for painting holidays. In the 1880s, there was a Swedish artists' colony at Grèz-sur-Loing, by the Fontainebleau woods. In due course the artists took the idea of the artists' colony back to Scandinavia with them. Anna Ancher (1859-1935) was a mistress of interior light and color. She generally used her effects to establish a quiet, contemplative mood. The sensitivity and gifted colorism of her paintings created soulful, intimate atmospheres. In the present canvas, she uses the contrast of sunlight and the silhouettes of potted plants and window crossbars on the wall and floor. Her color scheme is based on the contrasting blue of the wall and upholstery and the yellow of the curtains, an effect that is replicated in the blue smock and blonde hair of the girl sitting by the window.