Laurits Andersen Ring In the garden door CC0495 Poster

Laurits Andersen Ring, Woman standing in the garden doorway, 1897. The painting shows the artist's wife, Sigrid Kähler (1874-1923), whom he married in 1896. Sigrid is visibly pregnant and leaning against a doorpost. She looks a little tired and absorbed in thoughts. In front of her is a garden in spring, full of blooming trees. It seems likely that Ring has been contemplating how fragility and new life often goes hand in hand. The state of the garden seems suggest something similar. The garden is flowering, but there are many irregularities. Stems are crooked, even crippled, branches grow in every way they can, without care for symmetry. Ring (1854-1933) was one of the foremost Danish painters of the turn of the 20th century, who pioneered both symbolism and social realism in Denmark. For this painting he received the bronze medal at the 1900 World's fair in Paris.