"Byväg"
Signed A. Cleve and dated -15. Canvas 52.5 x 60 cm.
Acquired in Germany in the 1980s.
German private collection.
Swedish private collection.
1913 kom Agnes Cleve till Paris och anslöt sig till det svenska avantgardet som gick på Académie de la Palette, där ett kubistiskt bildtänkande rådde. Läraren Le Fauconnier stod för en mer modest kubistisk ståndpunkt, där kontakten med motivet fortfarande var tydlig, till skillnad från konstnärer som Pablo Picasso och George Braque som sökte lämna det uppenbart figurativa. I Paris mötte hon sin blivande make, konstnären John Jon-And och blev nära vän med svensken John Sten, som tidigt anammat det kubistiska i Paris. Agnes Cleve befinner sig 1915 mitt i livet, hon gifter sig med Jon-And och sonen Per-Erik föds. I den aktuella målningen kan även intryck från den tyska konstnärsgruppen Der Blaue Reiter, där Cleve var medlem spåras, med den kyliga paletten och det för tiden moderna uttrycket.
Agnes Cleve was born in Uppsala in 1876. After completing her secondary education, she studied art at the School of Arts and Crafts in Stockholm. When she started a family she moved to Gothenburg and studied art at Valand where Carl Wilhelmsson was her teacher. After a difficult divorce, Angnes moved to Paris in 1913, where she studied for Le Fauconnier together with John Jon-And. They eventually got married, and later moved to Stockholm and settling in Gothenburg. The couple often stayed at their summer cottage by the Gullmar Fjord, a place called Källviken, which became a gathering point for several artists, including the couple Gabriele Münter and Wassily Kandinsky. Kandinsky was, in his homecountry Germany, the leader of the group “Der Blaue Reiter”, a group which advocated for cubism and German modernism. It is without a doubt that they influences Agnes Cleve and Jon-And. Cleve has done several artists trips to paint Sandhamn, Skagen, London, Italy, Holland, Belgium, North Africa, Spain, Turkey, and the USA (where he even lived for a period). In Cleve’s collection, one can find figure paintings, window views, portraits, cityscapes, and west coast genres. Agnes Cleve's art was exhibited across Europe (Paris, Amsterdam, Copenhagen, among others). There was a lot of talk surrounding her exhibition together with none other than Sigrid Hjertén in Paris in 1937, and she was classified by a German critic as Sweden’s most influential artist during the first half of the 20th century. She is currently represented by the National Museum, Gothenburg’s Art Museum, Gävle Museum, Norrköping’s Museum to name a few.
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