Meet Carl Larsson - My New Favorite Artist

**Edited to add: View pages and pages of Carl Larsson's artwork here. I've linked to a few paintings in a paragraph below as well.**
I admit it...as much as I love color and creativity and expression, I'm really, really , really picky about the art that I display in my home. The color and style has to be just right and the mood the piece of art creates is just as important. Because I am so picky, I don't have very much art in my home:( But let me tell you, that will change once we are past all this dreadful remodeling because I have discovered a very talented Swedish artist, Carl Larsson (1853-1919) that has absolutely captured my heart.

Many of you may have already heard of him, but it wasn't until last night when I found a book about him (under piles of kids books at Goodwill) that I was introduced to his work. The book I found has little text and is filled with about 30 of his paintings - full 8 X 11 inch pages with no printing on the backs of them (perfect for pulling out to have matted and framed!). OH MY GOODNESS! No other artist that I know has captured most of the things that I hold dear in my life...home, children, simplicity, creativity, color...From what I've learned, he and his wife Karin (who was also and artist and textile designer) have been called the creators of Swedish design. Their colorfully and imaginately decorated small two story cottage really stood out among the very prim and proper Victorian homes of the time. According to the official Carl Larsson website, "Carl and Karin formed and furnished this house according to their own very special artistic taste and also the needs of their growing family."

They had eight children and really treated them much differently than Victorian children of the time were treated. They were the children of artists, so I would expect that to be true! "Meals were important to the Larsson family. The adults did not eat by themselves; they wanted the children around them. This surprised a number of visitors who were used to adults and children having separate lives. There are stories of the merry dinners, of gossiping with the neighbours over coffee and of card games during the dark winter evenings. Carl and Karin had brought home to Sweden, the French habit of remaining a long time at the dinner table for conversation."

If you look on his website, you'll see a few photos of their sweet little home. It is left today nearly exactly the way it was when they lived there. In the dining room, you'll find red chairs. "In our day the bright colours in the Dining Room may not seem so sensational. But contemporary writers had a lot to say about the "raw" colours, and indeed about the red chairs the Larssons had ordered from carpenter Arnbom in Sundborn." I read also, that just because a piece of furniture had been made in 1694, that didn't stop him from painting it - which during that time, just wasn't done! I have a feeling that color ran through his veins.

His paintings that I love so are the ones from his family life...just simple yet very detailed vignettes around their home. It is kind of eerie and surreal, in a way, to view his paintings and then view actual photos of their home because nothing really has changed. The rooms are the same - the furniture, the walls...everything. The only thing missing from the photos are the children and his wife that now only live in the rooms of the paintings.

"In the summer of 1894 it had rained for six straight weeks. "I went about in an insufferable mood", Carl Larsson wrote. Karin then suggested that he should sketch a few pictures of their home to cure his impatience." So this is how it all began - this series of books about his family and home. His books have been called the "Internet" of their time because they are so real and raw and gave a real view into their family life.

And, oh, how the colors are exquisite! You see, all the colors in his paintings are the colors that I long to incorporate into my own "cottage" - the reds, the greens, the yellows, and even some blue. So you can understand why I fell in love the moment I found this book hiding under a pile of books at Goodwill.

There is a painting, "Homework" of his children sitting at the table doing homework, another - "The Kitchen" portrays two of his girls in the kitchen churning butter while their kitten plays in the corner and the breeze blows up the sheer curtains on the open window, "Flowers on the Windowsill" pictures a daughter watering plants on the windowsill with mother's ball of yarn and knitting needles on the table, one of "Breakfast Under the Big Birch"...the whole family, including the dog, eating together at a big table outside, one entitled "Brita's Forty Winks" - the baby sleeping under a cozy red blanket in her cradle, "Shelling Peas" - the children helping with food preparation, one called "When the Children Have Gone to Sleep" which pictures Karin and Carl enjoying quiet time by lamplight, he reading the paper, she working on her needlework, "Hide and Seek" shows one of the adorable children at play, "A Lazy Corner" - I just want to curl up on that sofa!

There are so many of these sweet and charming little vignettes - I could just fall over! You know how in our time, we go about our homes clicking photos of our family and this and that, and are eager to share them with others? Well, that's what Carl Larssons paintings were all about. And I just can't wait to display them in my home...just knowing that this precious family and all the painted vignettes actually existed - and somehow still exist through the paintings.

I want to share some of these paintings with you but have run out of time! I'll have more later...until then, enjoy learning more about Carl Larsson on his website:)