Morning celebrations — two paintings by Carl Larsson
Let us look at two paintings by Carl Larsson depicting early morning greetings with breakfast in bed.
What exactly is happening in this first painting? With a closer look and help by Carl Larsson´s text in his book Ett hem from 1899 we can see the details. It is an early summer morning at Lilla Hyttnäs, the Larsson family´s home in Sundborn. The maid Emma in bed to the left is being celebrated on her name day by the Larsson children.
Suzanne is wearing her father´s tailcoat and high hat, reading a congratulation poem to Emma. In front of her Ulf is standing holding the tray with coffee, dressed in a traditional women´s costume from Rättvik, in another part of Dalarna. Note the black hat with red pom-poms. The girl in white, with flowers in hands and hair, must be Lisbeth, and the girl in a brown fur and what looks like a big hat, showing her usual happy face to the viewer, is Brita. Little Kersti is coming up the stairs with a flower arrangement forming a heart and the letter E for Emma in white flowers. Behind her we see Pontus in a bearded mask and his father´s high boots, holding a sabre in front of him.
We can also see a part of a man outside playing the fiddle. His name is Johan, Carl Larsson´s man at the farm Spadarvet. Maybe you wonder where Esbjörn is? He was not born at this time, as he was born in the year 1900.
The celebration is taking place in a härbre, a kind of storage house, arranged by the artist´s wife Karin to be used as a guest room in summertime, apparently in 1893 as you can see painted on the wall as well as embroidered on her textile with red pom-poms in the ceiling. Carl Larsson explains in his book A home that the maids were using this house only temporarily. It is situated near the water as you can see if you look closely. Can you see the boat?
Carl Larsson has signed this painting without the year, but it is probably painted in 1898 (Neergaard 1999). We do know the exact day of the year for this event though: Sunday 23rd of July, because that was — and still is — the official Emma-day, the day for everyone with the name Emma. Name days were more often celebrated than birthdays in this period of time. And in this family they always dressed up in costumes for the occasion.
Let´s look at another name day celebration in the Larsson family.
Here we see Karin being served breakfast in bed on the Karin-day 1899. Carl Larsson´s daughter Suzanne, to the left, and two other girls are draped in white and bunches of yellow water lilies from the river outside. Sitting in the bed at the back with big eyes is Brita, here six years old. Compare Brita on this painting and on the prevoius painting and you see one of the reasons why the previous painting is believed to be painted in 1898.
Three years after this event took place Carl Larsson explains in his book Larssons that what we see on the painting is Näcken and his daughters. Näcken is a Scandinavian mythological being, usually portrayed in the shape of a naked man sitting in the stream playing the fiddle to lure young people into the water.
But why does Carl Larsson´s Näcken have this long white beard like Santa Claus? Näcken is not known to have a beard or any daughters which instead brings your thoughts to the titan Oceanos (Okeanos) from Greek mythology who is most often depicted with a big flowing beard. He had three thousand daughters — the water nymphs (oceanids) — of which we here see two. Maybe Carl Larsson thought that his readers did not know enough of Greek mythology and decided to better call him Näcken who everyone knows about. The theme mythological water beings is either way the same. The yellow water plant has the Swedish name näckros after Näcken.
Apparently the greeting poem to Karin has already been read as it is rolled up in the hands of Näcken/Oceanos. Suzanne is holding a glass of water with a flower in it. Seems like there is not enough room for it on the breakfast tray. Carl Larsson writes that the girls had to stand in this position the whole day while he was painting them — to start with. Karin-day is on the second of August, the same time as when the näck-roses are in their best bloom.
Reference:
Neergaard, Ulwa. 1999. Carl Larsson: Signerat med pensel och penna. Stockholm: Norstedts
