Lot 241: Ivan Aguéli , Swedish 1869-1917 porträtt (portrait of a woman in profile) oil and gouache on canvas

oil and gouache on canvas

23.5 by 17.5cm., 9¼ by 7in.

Stockholm, Nationalmuseum, Agueli Utställningen, 1939, no. 187

Mrs Hertha Lublin, Stockholm (by 1939); thence by descent

PROPERTY FROM A PRIVATE COLLECTION, UNITED KINGDOM
A deep theoretical understanding of avant-garde painting placed Aguéli far in advance of his Nordic peers. From the 1890s onwards, his small-scale works painted in Paris provided a vital conduit for symbolist pioneers back in Sweden, such as the Varberg artists, Richard Bergh and Karl Nordström. In 1911, Aguéli summarised his prescient idiom in an article in the French periodical, La Gnose: 'Simplification is the principle not only of all art, but of any spiritual activity at all. It is the badge of mastery' (quoted in Torsten Gunnarsson, Nordic Landscape Painting, New Haven & London, 1998, p. 242).