Helene Schjerfbeck Finnish, 1862-1946

Probably, Stockholm, Stenmans Konstsalong, Helene Schjerfbeck, 1944, no. 87
Selected Museums in Canada and USA, Helene Schjerfbeck, 1948-53, no. 36
Helsinki, Taidehalli, Helene Schjerfbeck, 1954, no. 168
Stockholm, Stenmans Konstsalong, Helene Schjerfbeck, 1954, no. 108
Modum, Blaafarveværk, Helene Schjerfbeck, 1998, no. 97

Painted in 1942-3 when Helene Schjerfbeck was over eighty, this portrait of her nurse Ester Räihä shows that even in old age she had lost none of her artistic powers.

In 1942, at the height of the Second World War, Helene Schjerfbeck was evacuated from Loviisa and brought to the sanatorium of Luontola in Nummela, where she would remain for two years. Her limited output during this time included an exquisite series of landscapes as well as several portraits of the Luontola staff, the only models available to her.

Typically, Helene Schjerbeck would re-visit the same composition several times, in her characteristic reduced and abbreviated style. The present portrait is the first of three versions, and was followed by Finnish Nurse II and Finnish Nurse III (the latter illustrated in Helene Schjerfbeck, exhibition catalogue, Ateneum, Helsinki, 1992, p. 282). There is also a charcoal and watercolour drawing of Ester, now in the Gyllenberg collection (fig. 1). Among the other nurses Schjerfbeck painted in Luontola was Kaija Lahtinen, a watercolour and charcoal portrait of whom was sold in these rooms on 6 June 2001 (fig. 2).

Portraiture was central to Schjerfbeck's oeuvre, inspiring some of her profoundest reflections on art and mortality. As Salme Sarajas-Korte has noted: 'Over time, Schjerfbeck's portraits began to look less and less like their sitters, although she never made a total break with their basic appearance. Her private meditations are often reflected in these portraits more clearly than the character of the sitter; they portray Schjerfbeck more vividly than her models.' (op cit., p. 35)  

Gösta Stenman, who owned this picture, was Helene Schjerfbeck’s art dealer and a great influence creatively and financially. In 1917 Stenman had created and organised Schjerfbeck's first solo exhibition in his Helsinki gallery and her second solo exhibition in Stockholm in 1937. By 1938 she was under contract to Stenman, agreeing that for a monthly fee all her work would go to his gallery. This gave her financial security and artistic freedom. It was Stenman who encouraged Schjerfbeck to create a series of reinterpretations of her earlier work and more importantly her haunting and powerful self-portraits, which she continued to paint until the last few weeks of her life.