ESTHER KJERNER. View in green.

Oil on canvas, 34,5 x 26 cm, including frame 42 x 35 cm. Signed E Kerner.

With inventory number 1628 from Gösta Stenmans konsthandel.

The artist Esther Kjerner (1872-1952) is known for her lyrical landscapes and for her denomination-rich and timeless still life painting. By clinging to a traditional artistic expression at a time when modernism was burgeoning, attention and recognition were waiting. But when, in her seventies, she was highlighted by the art patron and gallerist Gösta Stenman, who saw her qualities with her taste and knowledge, her art finally received the great praise it so well deserved.
Esther Kjerner was born in Stockholm and came from a culturally encouraging home, which contributed to the fact that at the age of 17, in 1890, she began her studies at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts. With her closest companion from academia, Eva Bagge, she went on to Rome in 1896. Insatiable on studies of the masters of the Renaissance and of the beautiful historic city, Kjerner found here a painterly power and colorful energy by which her art was later often described.
In 1897, the friends went on to the bright healthy coastal landscape of Brittany. Here Kjerner found motifs from the locals and from the wind-beaten landscape. The following year followed studies at the legendary private art school Colarossi in Paris. This time also invited him to socialize with other Swedish artists who were in the metropolis. The journey was via Holland, where Kjerner and Bagge settled in Katzand. Here Kjerner felt an affinity with the landscape painting of her countrymen, both from the 17th century and contemporary, which had a great influence on her own.
The following year, Kjerner returned to Sweden, and then had his first exhibition, which took place at the Swedish Artists Association. This was followed by collective exhibitions both in Sweden and abroad. The breakthrough came, as mentioned initially, relatively late, in 1941, at her solo exhibition at the influential Gösta Stenman Art Salon. After this, her art became uplifted and established through its quality and grounding in tradition.