Georgia Maria Luise Skovgaard née Schouw (1828–1868) was a Danish

embroiderer Embroidery is the craft of decorating Textile, fabric or other materials using a sewing needle, needle to apply yarn, thread or yarn. Embroidery may also incorporate other materials such as pearls, beads, quills, and sequins. In modern days, emb ...

who is remembered above all for works depicting Danish flora, many of which were based on the artwork of her husband, the

Golden Age The term Golden Age comes from Greek mythology, particularly the ''Works and Days'' of Hesiod, and is part of the description of temporal decline of the state of peoples through five Ages of Man, Ages, Gold being the first and the one during ...

painter

P.C. Skovgaard Peter Christian Thamsen Skovgaard (known as P. C. Skovgaard; 4 April 1817 – 13 April 1875) was a Danish national romantic landscape painter. He is one of the main figures associated with the Golden Age of Danish Painting. He is especially known ...

. After her early death, her designs lived on after her student Kristiane Konstantin-Hansen used them to develop her own embroidery business.

Biography

Born on 27 September 1828 in

Copenhagen Copenhagen ( or .; da, København ) is the capital and most populous city of Denmark, with a proper population of around 815.000 in the last quarter of 2022; and some 1.370,000 in the urban area; and the wider Copenhagen metropolitan ar ...

, Georgia Maria Luise Schouw was the daughter of the botanist and politician

Joakim Frederik Schouw Joakim Frederik Schouw (7 February 1789 – 28 April 1852) was a Danish lawyer, botanist and politician. From 1821, professor in botany at the University of Copenhagen — first extraordinary professor, but after the death of J.W. Hornemann in 1 ...

(1789–1852) and his wife Susanne Marie Augustine Peschier Dalgas (1798–1844). Brought up in a lively Grundtvegian home among visitors from the Danish world of culture, she was not given a formal education but acquired skills in drawing, painting and needlework from the artists who were friends of her parents. She perfected her skills after marrying the painter P.C. Skovgaard (1817–75) on 3 September 1851. It was

N. F. S. Grundtvig Nikolaj Frederik Severin Grundtvig (; 8 September 1783 – 2 September 1872), most often referred to as N. F. S. Grundtvig, was a Danish pastor, author, poet, philosopher, historian, teacher and politician. He was one of the most influential peo ...

himself who conducted the marriage ceremony at which the bride wore a veil with honeysuckle and wild flowers which she had embroidered herself from a design by Skovgaard. The couple's artistic collaboration continued through their married life, frequently also inspired by artwork from their artist friends. Georgia Skovgaard sketched both classical monuments and naturalistic subjects while travelling in Italy with her husband in 1854–55. At the 1862 Scandinavian students meeting in Copenhagen, Skovgaard and her team sewed four banners as gifts for the various student associations. She instructed a number of other women in embroidery, first and foremost Kristiane Konstantin-Hansen who, after working for Skovgaard for a period, went on to open her own embroidery business together with

Johanne Bindesbøll Karen Johanne Bindesbøll (1851–1934) was a Danish textile artist who specialized in embroidery. Together with Kristiane Konstantin-Hansen, from 1873 she ran a retail business in Copenhagen, selling embroidered goods and training young women t ...

. It was Skovgaard who introduced the embroidery of Danish flora which was further developed at the beginning of the twentieth century by Gerda Bengtsson. Her husband also encouraged her to embroider depictions of animals including swans, dolphins, and deer which were often used in

upholstery Upholstery is the work of providing furniture, especially seats, with padding, springs, webbing, and fabric or leather covers. The word also refers to the materials used to upholster something. ''Upholstery'' comes from the Middle English word ...

. When only 39 years old, Georgia Skovgaard died in Copenhagen on 15 July 1868 while giving birth to a stillborn daughter. She is buried together with her husband in Copenhagen's

Assistens Cemetery Assistens Cemetery ( da, Assistens Kirkegård) is the name of a number of cemeteries in Denmark. The common nominator is, as the first part of the name implies (Latin: ''assistens'' meaning assisting), an assisting cemetery for a town's churches. ...

. Her patterns and designs continued to be used well into the 20th century by the embroiderers Konstantin-Hansen and Bindesbøll.

Exhibitions

While Skovgaard's works were not exhibited during her lifetime, they featured at the

1895 Copenhagen Women's Exhibition The Women's Exhibition from the Past and Present ( da, Kvindernes Udstilling fra Fortid og Nutid) held in Copenhagen in 1895 was an art and culture exhibition for women from the Nordic countries. Inspired by the 1893 World's Fair in Chicago, it ...

and at the P.C. Skovgaard exhibition at the

Kunstforeningen Kunstforeningen (English The Art Society), now officially called Gammel Strand after its address, is an exhibition space and non-profit membership organization located at Gammel Strand in Copenhagen, Denmark. It was founded in 1825 to promote and ...

in 1917. More recently, they formed part of the P.C. Skovgaard exhibition at the Skovgaard Museum in Viborg (1967). Georgia Skovgaard was also represented in the embroidery exhibitions at the

Danish Museum of Art & Design The Designmuseum Denmark () is a museum in Copenhagen for Danish and international design and crafts. It features works of famous Danish designers like Arne Jacobsen, Jacob Jensen and Kaare Klint, who was one of the two architects who remodeled ...

in 1983 and 1990.

Family

Skovgaard was the mother of three artists:

Joakim Skovgaard Joakim Frederik Skovgaard (18 November 1856 – 9 March 1933) was a Danish painter. He is remembered above all for the frescos which decorate Viborg Cathedral. Biography Born in Copenhagen, from an early age he was trained in drawing and paintin ...

(1856–1933),

Niels Skovgaard Niels Kristian Skovgaard (2 November 1858 – 3 February 1938) was a Danish painter and sculptor. His statue of N.F.S. Grundtvig is considered to be a masterpiece of Danish sculpture. Biography Born in Copenhagen, Skovgaard was the son of the nota ...

(1858–1938) and

Suzette Holten Suzette Catherine Holten (née Skovgaard, 29 January 1863 – 11 February 1937) was a Danish painter and ceramist who belonged to the Skovgaard family of artists. In addition to landscapes, flower paintings and portraits, she created and decorated ...

(1863–1937). Today there is a museum dedicated to the Skovgaard family.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Skovgaard, Georgia 1828 births 1868 deaths Artists from Copenhagen Danish textile artists 19th-century Danish artists Danish women artists Danish embroiderers 19th-century women textile artists 19th-century textile artists