Carl Skånberg - Garden with Blooming Chestnut Trees, France
Carl Skånberg (Norrköping 1850–1883 Stockholm)
Garden with Blooming Chestnut Trees, France
Stamp-signed “CARL SKÅNBERG”
painted 1875
oil on canvas
unframed: 45.5 x 72.6 cm (17 7/8 x 28 5/8 in)
framed: 66 x 93.5 cm (26 x 36 3/4 in)
The original gilded and ornamented frame with old patina is included.
Provenance:
Mrs. Ellen Skånberg (1861–1950), née Hintze, later married to Gyllensvärd;
Director Per Gabriel Palmquist (1865–1949), Stockholm
Literature:
V. Loos, Carl Skånberg – His Life and Work, Östgöta Art Association Publication, 1928, pp. 241–42, listed under 1875, no. 87, as “Farmstead. The painting depicts a Skåne farmstead with gray lime-washed buildings. By a stone wall, there are figures—a man smoking a pipe and a woman wearing a kerchief. The light green vegetation in the foreground is meticulously detailed. A large tree with a vast crown and red blossoms is silhouetted against the gray sky. In the foreground, there is a blooming rose bush.”
Essay:
Viggo Loos lists the painting under works from 1875 as a "Skåne farmstead," but this is likely incorrect. Skånberg was in France at that time. In this composition, he incorporates a blooming chestnut tree with red blossoms, indicating it is a sweet chestnut, a species found in France whose nuts are edible. This contrasts with the horse chestnut, more common in Sweden, with white blossoms and toxic nuts. Chestnut trees were exceedingly rare in Sweden at the time. In the 1860s, Olof Eneroth reported in Handbook of Swedish Pomology (1864–66) that chestnut trees at estates in Skåne—Tosterup, Rydsgård, and Vrams Gunnarstorp—bore fruit in warm summers. Alexandra Smirnoff, in a 1902 reissue of Eneroth’s book, described a young chestnut tree at Vibyholm in Södermanland yielding ripe fruit in 1873, which caused a sensation when exhibited in Vienna.
Two other paintings by Skånberg with similar motifs are known, both created in France in 1875–76: Garden Interior from Aumont [-en-Halatte], stamp-signed, 29 x 41 cm, formerly in the Conrad Pineus collection, Gothenburg (exhibition catalog, Norrköping Museum, Carl Skånberg Memorial Exhibition, September 28–October 31, 1946, no. 50) and French Farmstead, stamp-signed, 24 x 32 cm, previously in Axel Gauffin's collection (op. cit., no. 51). These works collectively support the conclusion that this painting was created in France.
Skånberg, a known pipe smoker, may have depicted the pipe-smoking man in the painting as a signature element.
Carl Skånberg was a pivotal figure in the breakthrough of Swedish plein-air painting. His free-spirited approach and radicalism place him alongside the early French Impressionists. Richard Bergh considered him instrumental in advancing the modern and radical direction in Swedish landscape painting. Georg Nordensvan wrote in Stockholms Dagblad, in conjunction with the Swedish Painting 1800–1885 exhibition at Liljevalchs in 1921:
"The journey [in landscape painting] goes from Fahlcrantz to Skånberg and Hill, from studio compositions to direct nature studies, from dusk to light and air..."
After completing his studies at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts, Skånberg traveled to Paris in the summer of 1875, continuing to Barbizon in the fall. The French landscape painting associated with Barbizon and the Fontainebleau Forest had influenced Alfred Wahlberg, and Skånberg worked there on a large canvas, Interior of Fontainebleau Forest, intended for the 1876 Philadelphia World’s Fair. When later exhibited at the Royal Academy in Stockholm, August Strindberg praised it for capturing the density of greenery and sunlight filtering through the canopy without succumbing to "mood painting" (a term then used to criticize works lacking focus on composition, shadows, or spatial depth).
From the Academy Days. Skånberg seated, with Ernst Josephson on the right.
In Paris, Skånberg became the centerpiece of the Swedish artistic community. In 1878, Carl Larsson painted his portrait, and in 1880, Ernst Josephson created a well-known full-length portrait capturing Skånberg’s witty, sharp demeanor and self-confident presence. Skånberg was short, hunchbacked since childhood, and, in his own words, "hardly an Adonis."
Ernst Josephson, Portrait of Carl Skånberg, 1880 (Gothenburg Museum of Art)
In early 1881, Skånberg traveled to Italy seeking relief from asthma, visiting Sicily, Venice, and Rome. In Venice, he painted one of his finest works, The Grand Canal, noted for its bold composition and gray-blue color palette, effectively evoking the rainy atmosphere of the city. The painting, gifted to Ernst Josephson and later donated to the National Museum, represents a culmination of his artistic maturity.
In Italy, Skånberg also met his future wife, Ellen Hintze, in the Scandinavian Association in Rome. They married in the spring of 1882 at the Swedish Consulate in Rome, with a festive reception attended by figures such as Henrik Ibsen. Skånberg’s health deteriorated in late 1882, and he returned to Stockholm, where he passed away shortly thereafter. Ellen remarried Sven Oskar Alexander Gyllensvärd and inherited Skånberg’s estate. Many of his unsigned works were subsequently stamped with his signature.
Skånberg was a trailblazer in Swedish plein-air painting. While some have noted Impressionistic tendencies in his work, there is no evidence he was deeply familiar with the Impressionists' methods or intentions; the similarities are more coincidental. Though he enjoyed some success during his lifetime, his true breakthrough came posthumously. A memorial exhibition featuring around 100 works brought widespread attention to his art, and several of his pieces were included in the Opponent Movement’s landmark 1885 exhibition.
During his short life, Skånberg achieved his greatest acclaim with The Harbor of Dordrecht, exhibited at the Paris Salon in 1880 and the 1881 Scandinavian Exhibition in Gothenburg. Purchased by Pontus Fürstenberg, the work is now housed in the Gothenburg Museum of Art.
