Early works – Still lifes and self-portraits

Lennart Rodhe began his studies in Copenhagen in the 1930s. The Foundation’s collection includes a large number of early works from this period, mainly portraits, self-portraits, interiors and still lifes. Self-Portrait (1935), from the time before Copenhagen, shows a serious young man painted in meticulous and realistic detail. In 1938, Rodhe was accepted at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Stockholm. He continued to spend a great deal of time in Copenhagen, however, attending classes at the Kunstakademiet despite not formally being enrolled. Here, unlike in Stockholm, he had access to contemporary continental modernism. During this period, he painted Self-Portrait (1937–38), och Gas Cooker with Fruits (1939–41), revealing a new approach to painting and perceiving the world. revealing a new approach to painting and perceiving the world. One of his still lifes features a simple gas burner, and the arrangement suggests a more dynamic, geometric composition. The German occupation in 1939 forced him to leave Denmark, and he returned to Stockholm in 1940. Stockholm was isolated during the war, and international influences were limited and took a long time to reach the young artists. Rodhe resorted to a small, intimate sphere of subject matter and the Swedish countryside, painting numerous landscapes on the rocky coast of Bohuslän. (The Canal at Tjörnekalv, 1943.)