The Artist's Mother Ane Hedvig Brøndum in the Blue Room

In The Artist's Mother Ane Hedvig Brøndum in the Blue Room, many of the defining traits of Anna Ancher’s painting after 1900 convene: Her endeavour to liberate colour and light, the emphasis on the picture plane rather than illusionistic depth, and not least her interest in constructive elements which can be seen in the cropping of the two columns of light reflexes. As in other interieurs, the room is dense with objects; however all things – from the old mother to the table, chairs, and paintings on the walls – have been subordinated to the coloristic effect of the whole. Along with Theodor Philipsen (1840-1920), Anna Ancher is regarded as the most important Impressionistic painter on the Danish art scene. But whereas the French Impressionists were intimately linked with modern life, Anna Ancher painted her pictures on the outskirts of the modern: from Skagen, the remotest part of Denmark, more opposed to than in tune with the hectic and the ephemeral.