Åsmund (Aasmund) Esval (16 February 1889 – 17 October 1971,

Oslo Oslo ( or ; ) is the capital and most populous city of Norway. It constitutes both a county and a municipality. The municipality of Oslo had a population of in 2022, while the city's greater urban area had a population of 1,064,235 in 2022 ...

) was a Norwegian painter.

Biography

Aasmund Esval was born at Nes in

Romerike Romerike is a Districts of Norway, traditional district located north-east of Oslo, in what is today south-eastern Norway. It consists of the Akershus municipalities Lillestrøm, Lørenskog, Nittedal, Rælingen and Aurskog-Høland in the southern ...

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic countries, Nordic country located on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and the archipelago of Svalbard also form part of the Kingdom of ...

. From 1909 to 1919, Esval was educated at the

Norwegian National Academy of Craft and Art Industry The National College of Art and Design () was established in 1818. In 1996, the National College of Art and Design became part of Oslo National Academy of the Arts (''Kunsthøgskolen i Oslo'', KHiO), along with the Norwegian National Academy of ...

. Esval trained at the Académie de l'Art Moderne in Paris under

Othon Friesz Achille-Émile Othon Friesz (6 February 1879 – 10 January 1949), who later called himself Othon Friesz, a native of Le Havre, was a French artist of the Fauvist movement. Biography Othon Friesz was born in Le Havre, the son of a long line of ...

and

Raoul Dufy Raoul Dufy (; 3 June 1877 – 23 March 1953) was a French painter associated with the Fauvist movement. He gained recognition for his vibrant and decorative style, which became popular in various forms, such as textile designs, and public build ...

from 1919 to 1921. Esval studied at the Académie Scandinave Maison Watteau in Paris under Per Krogh from 1926 to 1927, and at the

Norwegian National Academy of Fine Arts The Norwegian National Academy of Arts () was a former Norwegian tertiary institution in Oslo, offering studies in the area of fine art. Along with four other academies, it merged to form the Oslo National Academy of the Arts (, KHiO) in 1996. ...

under Georg Jacobsen 1935–1937. In the 1950s and 1960s, Esval taught at Friundervisningen in Oslo. Also during his career, Esval also taught drawing at the

. Esval was primarily a landscape painter that performed a series of quiet Norwegian landscapes constructed by geometric principles. Esval lived in several local farms in

Gudbrandsdal Gudbrandsdalen (; ) is a valley and traditional district in the Norwegian county of Innlandet (formerly Oppland). The valley is oriented in a north-westerly direction from Lillehammer and the lake of Mjøsa, extending toward the Romsdalen vall ...

, Norway during the 1950s and 1960s. The painting ''Ringebu Kirke'' is an example of the many landscape scenes he obtained from the Norwegian valleys. In 1928, Esval made the stained glass windows of Tangen Church (''Tangen kirke'') in

Drammen Drammen () is a city and municipality in Buskerud county, Norway. The port and river city of Drammen is centrally located in the south-eastern and most populated part of Norway. Drammen municipality also includes smaller towns and villages such ...

, Norway. Additionally Esval did portrait painting including subjects such as Ruth Maier who was a model for Esval during her time in Norway. Maier was an Austrian woman whose diaries describing her experiences of the

Holocaust The Holocaust (), known in Hebrew language, Hebrew as the (), was the genocide of History of the Jews in Europe, European Jews during World War II. From 1941 to 1945, Nazi Germany and Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy ...

in Austria and Norway were published in 2007 by Norwegian poet

Jan Erik Vold Jan Erik Vold (born 18 October 1939) is a Norwegian lyric poet, reciter, translator and author. He was a member of the so-called "''Profil'' generation", the circle attached to the literary magazine '' Profil''. Throughout his career, he has con ...

. Maier was deported to

Auschwitz Auschwitz, or Oświęcim, was a complex of over 40 concentration and extermination camps operated by Nazi Germany in occupied Poland (in a portion annexed into Germany in 1939) during World War II and the Holocaust. It consisted of Auschw ...

in November 1942, where she was killed on arrival, aged only twenty-two. Beginning in 1928, Esval was a regular participant in the Autumn Exhibition (''Høstutstillingen'') in Oslo. Esval is represented in the Norwegian National Gallery of Art, Norwegian National Touring Exhibitions and Norwegian Royal Gallery.

Bibliography

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References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Esval, Asmund 20th-century Norwegian painters Oslo National Academy of the Arts alumni People from Nes, Akershus 1971 deaths 1889 births