Before Ida, There Was Anna – Early Portrait of Vilhelm Hammershøi’s Sister up for Auction

Vilhelm Hammershøi continues to achieve record hammer prices worldwide. Now the earliest known portrait of the sister Anna Hammershøi is up for sale at Bruun Rasmussen Auctioneers – Part of the Bonhams Network with an estimate of DKK 1-1.5 million.

When Vilhelm Hammershøi’s famous paintings are brought up in conversations, his wife Ida often comes to mind. However, it was the sister Anna Hammershøi who was a favourite model in an important early phase of the young Vilhelm Hammershøi’s artistic development. On 14 June, the earliest known portrait of the sister Anna Hammershøi is up for sale at Bruun Rasmussen in Copenhagen. The offered work remained in her ownership until her death in 1955. The estimate is DKK 1-1.5 million.

“In the later works of Vilhelm Hammershøi (1864-1916), it is often his wife Ida Hammershøi who is the model for the female figures with their backs turned, which have almost become the artist's trademark along with his interiors. Before he married Ida, however, it was the artist's immediate family; his mother Frederikke, younger brother Svend and sister Anna, who were used as models. Hammershøi was close with all three of these members of his family throughout his whole life,” says Julie Arendse Voss, specialist in 19th century Art and Old Masters at Bruun Rasmussen Auctioneers.

First Piece in the Story of Hammershøi’s Art

Friends and family continued to be an inspiration for Hammershøi in his art, and with the early works of Anna Hammershøi, the sister played a significant role in the period when Hammershøi found his place as the renowned artist he is in art history.

”The present portrait is the first piece in this story, which makes it particularly interesting and remarkable. It is easy to understand why the portrait remained in Anna's possession until her death in 1955,” says Julie Arendse Voss

The portrait belongs to a series of paintings with Anna as a model, which Hammershøi made as a young painter in the mid-1880s. This series includes such important early works as Hammershøi's debut work at Charlottenborg "Portræt af en ung pige" (Portrait of a Young Girl), 1885, and “En ung pige, der syr” (Young Girl Sewing), 1887. The latter was rejected by the Charlottenborg censorship, which caused great anger and frustration among many artists. In response to the censorship committee's outdated view of art, the artists created, with the French Salon des Refusés as inspiration, Den Frie Udstilling (The Free Exhibition), where Hammershøi exhibited annually until his death in 1916.

An Enigmatic Portrait

In the present portrait, we get close to Anna's face. Her gaze is inward, engrossed in her own thoughts in her very own space. Rather than being a 1:1 reproduction of the sister’s features, it is still the enigmatic mood that dominates, according to Julie Arendse Voss.

“The work is deliberately blurred so that we don't get a precise sense of Anna's face right away. For Hammershøi, it is as much about the artistic expression as it is about capturing his sister's personality. He is going for something else than a passive reproduction, where the likeness is not the overall goal,” says Julie Arendse Voss.

At the same time as Vilhelm Hammershøi painted and drew his portraits of Anna in the 1880s, his good friend and fellow artist, Valdemar Schønheyder Møller, took several evocative photos of Anna, which can be seen as connected to Hammershøi’s artwork.

As part of Bonhams' network of global auction houses, Hammershøi's portrait of Anna Hammershøi will be offered at a Live Auction on Wednesday 14 June in Copenhagen. The painting can also be experienced at the preview from 7 to 11 June in Bredgade 33, Copenhagen.