HÅNDVÆRK bookazine no. 3
Feeling at home
I live in Denmark, I was born on the Danish island of Funen (Fyn) and spent most of my adult years in Copenhagen. From 2006 to 2016 I lived in Stockholm, and I think of Stockholm as my second hometown. I go there often, most recently a few months ago. I had curated craft objects for the blås & knåda gallery’s summer exhibition, Stockholms längsta bord (Stockholm’s Longest Table), and I went to set up the exhibition.
While I was installing the exhibition and afterwards, as I was taking the photos for the article on pages 10–17, I stayed in the archipelago south of Stockholm, an island landscape that is celebrated by Stockholmers and tourists alike, and for good reason.
During my first years in Stockholm I thought maybe the archipelago was a bit overrated. Honestly, this was because I missed Danish nature and landscapes, missed feeling at home. Funen’s gently rolling hills speak my language and sing my songs.
The previous summer I found, to my delight, that returning to the archipelago was like coming home, and when I listened carefully, the wind sang beautiful Swedish summer songs that resonated in my heart.
The people of Funen
There is no doubt that my childhood home on Funen has shaped the choices I have made. I can see it ever more clearly the older I get; see what I carry with me from my upbringing and also how I began to search for different paths from an early age.
My aunt unwittingly showed me one of those paths when she took me on a visit to the house that is now the Johannes Larsen Museum on Møllebakken in the town of Kerteminde. In my childhood, in the late 1960s, the house was home to the painter Johannes Larsen’s daughter-in-law, Else, while his grandson, the artist Jeppe Larsen and Jeppe’s wife, Else, and their children lived in the adjacent studio. Else was a nurse and a colleague of my aunt’s.
Background
Johannes Larsen was born in 1867 in Kerteminde. His father was a merchant, among other enterprises. Johannes’s uncle Johan Peter Bless was a portrait artist and one of the first to spot the boy’s talent for drawing and painting. Bless began to give him drawing lessons and convinced Johannes’s parents that instead of going into business, Johannes should study art. And so, as a teen, he went to Copenhagen to attend Kristian Zahrtmann’s private art school.
Johannes Larsen was one of the Funen Painters and is best known for his lifelike pictures of birds.
His wife Alhed (née Warberg), born 1872, was the daughter of a land agent from southern Funen. Her parents gave their children a liberal upbringing and introduced them to culture and the arts. They learned the art of conversation and received classes in both music and the visual arts. Fritz Syberg, who went on to become one of the famous members of the Funen Painters, gave drawing and painting lessons to Alhed and her siblings.
As an adult, Alhed painted the typically female topics of her time, such as flowers, interiors and views from her window.
Johannes and Alhed met on the artist scene in Copenhagen and married in 1898. In 1901–02 they built the house on Møllebakken, where they lived until Alhed’s death in 1927. The couple had two sons, Andreas and Johan. After Alhed’s death, Andreas and his wife, Else, and their three children lived in the house on Møllebakken together with Johannes Larsen, who had a close relationship with the children. Johannes Larsen died in 1961. Jeppe Larsen was the only one of Johannes Larsen’s grandchildren to follow in his grandfather’s footsteps and become a painter.
A total work of art
I love the house on Møllebakken and have returned many times since it opened as a museum in 1986.
The museum includes Alhed and Johannes Larsen’s private home and studio as well as two newer wings, one housing a permanent exhibition of works by Johannes Larsen, Fritz Syberg and other prominent Funen Painters, the other showcasing varying temporary exhibitions – the museum’s rapid heartbeat, as the Head of Department, Jeppe Priess Gersbøll, calls them.
Jeppe has a PhD in art history from the University of Copenhagen. He also has extensive knowledge of the house on Møllebakken and the life that unfolded here, based on in-depth studies as well as frequent visits throughout his life in connection with holiday stays with his grandmother in Kerteminde. In 2019, he took up the position as head of department of the museum and moved his family from Copenhagen to Kerteminde.
I recently spoke with Jeppe to try to grasp what it was that so enchanted my younger self when I first came here as a child.
Jeppe describes the Larsen family’s home as a total work of art. The architecture and the interior of the house are in the skønvirkestyle, the Danish variant of art deco. Like her husband, Alhed Larsen was a practising artist as well as a formidable hostess. ‘The family home may have been her most important – and certainly her best-known – work of art,’ says Jeppe. He explains that she not only created a beautiful setting for the family’s life but also a hospitable and, in every sense, welcoming artistic and creative meeting place that helped shape the development of the cultural scene in Denmark for several decades during the early 20th century. A place where opposites could meet or alternate in turns. Thus, both Johannes V. Jensen and his sister, Thit Jensen, would visit, just as a young and enquiring Poul Henningsen would enjoy the couple’s hospitality. When the artists and cultural personalities of the day knocked on the door, they not only stopped by but often lingered, as dinners stretched into a night of dancing, and extra beds were made up to accommodate overnight guests. Alhed created the setting and was an active participant, while Johannes observed from the sidelines.
Largesse
The sense of largesse still lingered in the air when I visited the house as a young girl. Although I did not come here that many times, the visits are etched into my memory. The atmosphere resonated with and nourished my young soul, and a dream began to take shape. A dream of a creative life, far from suburbia and the white picket fence, a dream of a life with a wider scope and more colour.
I am certain that my aunt had not intended this effect. In fact, I imagine that where I saw admirable largesse, she saw chaos. And the place probably was chaotic, but it was also a rich source of inspiration for my dream of an unconventional home.
A dream that I have lived out in my own adult life. It has not always been pretty, and there have been bumps along the way. At times, it has been chaotic and messy, but there have always been visions, there have often been many people seated around the long table, and even if the space was cramped, there was always plenty of room for big dreams.
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Øvrige billeder: Interiør JOHANNES LARSEN MUSEET
Jeg har hjemme i Danmark, jeg er født på Fyn og har boet de fleste af mine voksne år i København.
Fra 2006 til 2016 boede jeg i Stockholm, og jeg betragter Stockholm som min hjemby no. 2. Jeg er der ofte, senest for nogle måneder siden, da jeg havde kurateret kunsthåndværk til galleriet blås & knådas sommerudstilling, Stockholms længste bord, og skulle etablere udstillingen.
Mens jeg byggede udstilling og efterfølgende, mens jeg fotograferede til den artikel, du kan læse på s. 10-17, boede jeg i skærgården syd for Stockholm.
Skærgården, som med god grund besynges af både stockholmerne og af turister fra nær og fjern.
Under mine første år i Stockholm tænkte jeg i mit stille sind, at skærgården var lidt opreklameret. Ærligt indrømmet fordi jeg savnede min hjemlige danskenatur, savnede at føle mig hjemme. De fynske bakker taler mit sprog og synger mine sange.
Den forgangne sommer konstaterede jeg til min glæde, at gensynet med skærgården var gensynet med noget hjemligt, og da jeg lyttede efter, sang vinden på smukkeste vis svenske sommersange, som jeg kunne nynne med på.
Fynboerne
Det er uden for enhver diskussion, at mit fynske barndomshjem har haft stor indflydelse på mine valg og fravalg, det ser jeg tydeligere og tydeligere, jo ældre jeg bliver; jeg ser, hvad jeg har taget med
mig i bagagen; jeg ser også, at jeg tidligt i livet søgte for at finde alternative spor at forfølge.
Et af de spor kom min tante intetanende til at lægge ud, da hun tog mig med på besøg i det hus, som nu er Johannes Larsen Museet på Møllebakken i Kerteminde. I min barndom i slut-60erne var huset beboet af maleren Johannes Larsens svigerdatter,
Else, og atelieret på Møllebakken beboet af barnebarnet Jeppe Larsen, som var kunstner, og af dennes hustru Else og deres børn. Sidstnævnte Else var sygeplejerske og kollega til min tante.
Baggrund
Johannes Larsen blev født 1867 i Kerteminde. Hans far var storkøbmand, blandt andet. Johannes’ onkel Johan Peter Bless, som var portrætmaler,blev tidligt opmærksom på, at drengen havde talent for at tegne og male. Onklen begyndte derfor at undervise ham i tegning og overbeviste forældrene om, at Johannes i stedet for at gå købmandsvejen skulle uddannes som kunstmaler. Han blev derfor som stor dreng sendt på Kristian Zahrtmanns private malerskole i København.
Johannes Larsen var en af ‘Fynboerne’, først og fremmest kendt for sine naturtro fuglebilleder. Alhed Warberg (gift Larsen), født 1872, var datter af et sydfynsk godsforvalterpar. Godsforvalterfamilien fandt det passende at give børneflokken en fri og kulturelt dannet opdragelse. De lærte at samtale, og de modtog undervisning i både musik og billedkunst. Fritz Syberg, som senere blev kendt som en af ‘Fynboerne’, underviste således Alhed og hendes søskende i tegning og maleri.
Som voksen malerinde malede Alhed de for tiden kvindetypiske motiver som blomster, interiører og udsigten fra vinduet. Johannes og Alhed mødtes i kunstmiljøet i København og blev gift i 1898.
I 1901-02 byggede de villaen på Møllebakken. Her boede de sammen indtil Alheds død i 1927. Parret fik to sønner, Andreas og Johan. Andreas og hans kone Else og deres tre børn boede i villaen på Møllebakken sammen med Johannes Larsen efter Alheds død, og børnene voksede op i en nær relation til deres farfar.
JohannesLarsen døde i 1961. Kun et af Johannes Larsensbørnebørn, den føromtalte Jeppe Larsen, gik i sin farfars fodspor og blev maler.
Gesamtkunstwerk
Jeg holder meget af huset på bakken og har været tilbage flere gange, efter at det i 1986 blev åbnet som museum.
Museet omfatter Alhed og Johannes Larsens private hjem og atelier foruden to nyere fløje, den ene med permanent udstilling af Johannes Larsen, Fritz Syberg og andre af de fremtrædende Fynboere, den anden danner ramme om skiftende særudstillinger.
Museets hurtige pulsslag, som afdelingsleder Jeppe Priess Gersbøll kalder særudstillingerne.
Jeppe Priess Gersbøll er ph.d. i kunsthistorie fra Københavns Universitet og har et indgående kendskab til huset på Møllebakken og til det liv, som det har dannet ramme om. Dels har han læst, dels har han gennem hele sit liv besøgt stedet i forbindelse med ferieophold hos sin mormor i Kerteminde.
I 2019 tiltrådte han sin stilling som afdelingsleder og flyttede med sin familie fra København til Kerteminde.
Jeg talte for nylig med Jeppe. Jeg ville på sporet af, hvad det var, som havde virket så fortryllende på min barnesjæl.
Jeppe omtaler det Larsenske hjem som et stykke Gesamtkunstwerk. Huset er bygget og indrettet i skønvirkestil. Alhed Larsen var ligesom sin mand udøvende kunstner, hun var også en formidabel værtinde. “Måske var hjemmet hendes største, i al fald hendes mest kendte, kunstværk”, mener Jeppe.
Han fortæller, at hun skabte, ikke bare en smuk ramme om familiens liv, men også et gæstfrit og på alle måder rummeligt, kunstnerisk og kreativt mødested, som satte sit præg på udviklingen af kulturlivet i Danmark igennem årtier i det tidlige 20. århundrede.
Her kunne modsætninger mødes eller komme på skift. Således kom både Johannes V. Jensen og Thit Jensen i huset, ligesom en ung og søgende Poul Henningsen nød godt af gæstfriheden, og ikke bare kom datidens kunstnere og kulturpersonligheder forbi, de slog sig ned; ofte var der mange til bords og mange til dans og mange til overnatning. Alhed satte rammen og deltog, Johannes så til.
Storheden
Storheden hang stadig i væggene, da jeg som lille pige var på besøg på Møllebakken. Jeg var der ikke mange gange, men besøgene står mejslet i min erindring.
Min længselsfulde barnesjæl søgte og fandt næring til en drøm. En drøm om et kreativt liv langt fra parcelhusets ligusteridyl, en drøm om et liv med større armbevægelser.
Jeg er sikker på, at det fra min tantes side var helt utilsigtet. Jeg vil endda gå så vidt som at påstå, at hvor jeg så efterstræbelsesværdig storhed, så hun kaos. Kaos var der sikkert, men der var også næring til min drøm om et ukonventionelt hjem. En drøm, som jeg har levet i mit voksenliv. Det har ikke været noget skønmaleri og ikke uden bump på vejen, indimellem har der været kaos og stormvejr, men der har altid været visioner, ofte mange rundt om det lange bord, og selv når stuerne har været små, har der været højt til loftet.
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