102. KARL CEDERBERG (1861-1904). Girl with dog.

Oil on canvas, 39 x 28 cm. Signed and dated K Cederberg 1898.

The talented Linköping son Karl Cederberg joined the Academy of Fine Arts at the age of seventeen in 1878. When he joined the opposition, the father, who was an alderman, withdrew his support and put his son back in Linköping's school system. Karl then studied in Uppsala, but despite his father's objections also continued his art studies, including in Paris, where both his technique and coloristic sense developed under the influence of the open-air realism of the time. In 1885 Karl Cederberg exhibited at the Art Academy's exhibition.

Even when the national romantic currents of the 1890s began to emerge in Swedish art, Karl Cederberg was faithful to the ideal of French open-air realism with its fresh colour, which we see an exquisite example of in the auction's inaugural painting from 1898, depicting a girl sitting with a puppy in the shade under a tree on a hot summer day.

With his untimely passing in 1904, at the age of only 43, Karl Cederberg came to remain for a long time forgotten in Swedish art history. Something of a rediscovery was made when his “Promenade i gården”, an oil painting in format 45 x 59 cm from 1889 was sold at Stockholms Auktionsverks Klassiska auction in spring 2016 for 55,000 kronor.