Image source: Wikimedia Commons (Public domain). View source
Summer Evening on Skagen's Beach
Peder Severin Krøyer · Impressionism
- Artist
- Peder Severin Krøyer (1851–1909)
- Date
- 1893
- Dimensions
- 100 x 150 cm
- Medium
- Oil on canvas
- Location
- Skagens Museum, Skagen, Denmark
This painting shows two women in long white dresses walking arm in arm along the wide, empty beach at Skagen, at the northern tip of Denmark, on a summer evening. The sea, the sand and the sky melt together in soft blue light.
A closer look
The two women are the painters Marie Krøyer, the artist's wife, and Anna Ancher, both members of the Skagen artists' colony. Krøyer was fascinated by the 'blue hour', the long, luminous twilight of Nordic summer, when the sky and the sea take on the same pale blue tone. The figures are placed off-centre, their long shadows and the dog beside them giving depth to the vast flat space. The atmosphere is calm and dreamy, a celebration of light and friendship that has become an image of Danish summer.