Frozen: painting the winter ice 1883-1917

In this the second of the pair of articles showing paintings exploring the physical and optical properties of winter ice, I resume my account in 1883, after Impressionism had started to sweep across Europe.

Frits Thaulow (1847–1906), Winter at the River Simoa (1883), oil on canvas, 49.5 x 78.5 cm, Nasjonalgalleriet, Oslo, Norway. Wikimedia Commons.

The Norwegian artist Frits Thaulow was one of the Nordic Impressionists who met in Skagen, Denmark. During the 1880s he developed what came to dominate the paintings of his later career, optical effects on the surface of rivers. He painted this scene of Winter at the River Simoa in 1883. A lone woman, dressed quite lightly for the conditions, is rowing her tiny boat over the quietly flowing river, toward the tumbledowns on the other side. The surface of the river shows the glassy ripples so common on semi-turbulent water, and the effect on the reflections is visibly complex. The distant side of the river is also partly frozen, breaking its reflections further.

Frits Thaulow (1847–1906), Spring Thaw (1887), pastel on canvas, 48 x 73 cm, Nationalmuseum, Stockholm, Sweden. Image by Bodil Karlsson / Nationalmuseum, via Wikimedia Commons.

Thaulow’s Spring Thaw from 1887 captures perfectly the peculiar softness of such scenes in early spring, as the meltwater is still icy cold and ice remains around its edges.

Emile Claus (1849–1924), De ijsvogels (The Ice Birds, Skaters) (1891), oil on canvas, 148.5 x 205 cm, Musée des Beaux-Arts, Gent. WikiArt.

Emile Claus’s dazzling view of a small group of skaters in The Ice Birds (1891) was inspired by a contemporary novella, and shows the flooded swampy area near Waregem when frozen over in winter. Claus draws a distinction here between the less reflective surface of snow, and the ice that’s richly coloured in the winter sunlight.

Jahn Ekenæs (1847–1920), Women Doing Laundry Through a Hole in the Ice (1891), oil on canvas, 67 × 108 cm, Private collection. Wikimedia Commons.

Another Norwegian artist, Jahn Ekenæs here demonstrates that even in the bitter Nordic winters, the washing still had to be done, and only one of the women in his Women Doing Laundry Through a Hole in the Ice (1891) is wearing anything on her hands. Broken blocks of ice in the right foreground demonstrate its thickness, although that’s barely adequate to support the horse and sledge in safety.

Lesser Ury (1861–1931), Tiergarten in Winter (1892), pastel on paper, 50.7 x 35.7 cm, location not known. Wikimedia Commons.

One of Lesser Ury’s more conventional motifs, his beautiful pastel of Tiergarten in Winter from 1892 shows the large park to the west of the Brandenburger Tor in Berlin, with its blue river frozen over and a good covering of snow.

Hans Andersen Brendekilde (1857–1942), Melting Snow (1895), oil on canvas, 108 × 124 cm, Fyns Kunstmuseum, Odense, Denmark. Wikimedia Commons.

Hans Andersen Brendekilde’s Melting Snow from 1895 is a wonderful depiction of a harsh winter in the country. An elderly couple are doing the outside jobs in typically grey and murky weather, in the backyard of their thatched smallholding. He has walked down to fetch a pail of water from a hole in the ice on the river. Around it the ice is discoloured from contaminants in the water and surely not fit to drink.

Eugène Jansson (1862–1915), Riddarfjärden. A Stockholm Study (1898), oil on canvas, 112 x 42 cm, Nationalmuseum, Stockholm, Sweden. Wikimedia Commons.

During the early New Year of 1898, Eugène Jansson painted Riddarfjärden. A Stockholm Study from his studio, with ghostly blue ice covering much of the water below. A small steam vessel is making its way along the ice-free channel towards the foreground.

Lovis Corinth (1858–1925), Ice Rink in the Berlin Tiergarten (1909), oil on canvas, 64 × 90 cm, Private collection. Wikimedia Commons.

When Lovis Corinth lived and worked in Berlin, he too painted the occasional urban landscape of the city, including this wintry Ice Rink in the Berlin Tiergarten from 1909, where Berliners are skating on frozen lakes in the city’s zoo.

Edward Adrian Wilson (1872–1912), The Great Ice Barrier – looking east from Cape Crozier (4 January 1911), watercolour, in “Scott’s Last Expedition” (1913). Dodd, Mead, and Company, New York, Volume I, Page 51. Wikimedia Commons.

A couple of years later, at the other end of the earth, Edward Wilson’s watercolour of The Great Ice Barrier – looking east from Cape Crozier was painted in the austral summer, on 4 January 1911. This shows small groups of penguins on the ice cliffs at the edge of the Ross Ice Shelf in the Antarctic.

Tom Thomson (1877–1917), After the Sleet Storm (1915-16), oil on canvas, 40.9 x 56.2 cm, Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto, ON. The Athenaeum.

Back in the Northern Hemisphere, the young Canadian artist Tom Thomson painted After the Sleet Storm in his studio during the winter of 1915-16, from oil sketches he had made in front of the motif. This shows the beautiful effects not of frost as such but of sleet frozen onto the canopies of birch trees, in the winter half-light. Pale pinks and blues shown on the trees here are reminiscent of spring blossom.

Tom Thomson (1877–1917), Snow in October (1916-17), oil on canvas, 82.1 x 87.8 cm, National Gallery of Canada / Musée des beaux-arts du Canada, Ottawa, ON. The Athenaeum.

Thomson’s Snow in October (1916-17) is another well-known studio painting that Thomson made the following winter. Its fine geometric reticulations of frozen white canopies are a surprise, and an opportunity for the artist to use subtle colour and patterns in its shadows.

It’s high time to return indoors and warm up with a glass of mulled wine.