Room with a View of the External Gallery. Strandgade 30 (1903)
Collection: Davids Samling, Copenhagen

Open Doors. Strandgade 30 (1905)
Collection: Davids Samling, Copenhagen

Sitting Room. Study in Sunlight. Strandgade 30 (1906)
Collection: Davids Samling, Copenhagen

all photographs © 2019 Leslie Hossack

After months of researching Danish artist Vilhelm Hammershøi, Leslie Hossack travelled to Copenhagen to view his paintings as they were meant to be seen – framed on a wall.

Hossack photographed works by Hammershøi in three galleries in Copenhagen, as well as Paris, Ottawa and Toronto. It is important to note that the 100 images she created are not colour corrected; rather, they reflect the actual viewing conditions encountered in each gallery. For example, the Hammershøi paintings in the David Collection are in a room with coral coloured walls. Thus the photographs above have a red cast to them.

Hammershøi’s works, particularly his interiors, are known for their lack of colour. But in reality, his muted grays reward the gallery-goer with a tantalizing range of luminous colours, as can be seen in the images above.

“The artist developed into a value painter, in whose work each gray tone contains an undercoat of red, brown, green, blue, for example, but whose overall expression is gray.”
Henrik Wivel, Hammershøi in the David Collection (2017)

Above we see the interior of the apartment at Strandgade 30 where Vilhelm and his wife Ida lived from 1898 to 1909. Characteristically, the sparse rooms are staged and devoid of people.

Hammershøi’s oeuvre consists of portraits, nudes, landscapes, architecture and interiors, but it is his interiors, like the three shown above, that were the most popular in his lifetime (1864-1916) and continue to draw the strongest response today. Hammershøi painted over 100 interiors in the various apartments he shared with his wife Ida in Copenhagen. Their home was both his studio and a major motif in his work.

Over a century ago, Danish painter Vilhelm Hammershøi elevated
“Stay At Home. Work At Home.” to an art form.

Leslie Hossack’s Hammershøi Photographs are part of a larger body of work that explores Hitler’s Berlin, Stalin’s Moscow, Mussolini’s Rome, Churchill’s London, contested sites in Jerusalem, the NATO Headquarter Camp in Kosovo, buildings linked to the Japanese Canadian internment during WWII, the D-Day landing beaches of Normandy, the Nazi-occupied Channel Islands, Scotland’s Freemasons and Sigmund Freud’s Vienna.

To view more photographs by Leslie Hossack, please visit lesliehossack.com

Kongevejen at Gentofte (1892)
Collection: Davids Samling, Copenhagen

From a Farm. Refnœs (1900)
Collection: Davids Samling, Copenhagen

Young Beech Forest, Frederiksvoerk (1904)
Collection: Davids Samling, Copenhagen

Three Ships, Christianshavn Canal (1905)
Collection: Davids Samling, Copenhagen

The Rowan Avenue at Snekkersten (1906)
Collection: Davids Samling, Copenhagen

all photographs © 2019 Leslie Hossack

Vilhelm Hammershøi usually painted indoors, but during the summer months he did paint landscapes outdoors, in various locations around Denmark. The landscapes in his oeuvre are fewer, and certainly less well known, than his celebrated interiors.

Naturally, the outdoor summer light had a different quality than the winter light that streamed through the windows of Hammershøi’s Copenhagen apartment. But upon contemplation, one can see a similarity between his interiors and landscapes.

“… essentially, their mood is identical to the mood in the artist’s other output. There is a feeling of alienation and desertion in Hammershøi’s landscapes. They are not devoid of the hallmarks of agrarian culture, such as farms, mills, and fields; they are devoid of biological activity and life.”
Henrik Wivel, Hammershøi in the David Collection (2017)

Hammershøi’s oeuvre consists of portraits, nudes, architecture, interiors and landscapes like the five shown above. But it was his interiors that were the most popular in his lifetime (1864-1916) and continue to draw the strongest response today. Hammershøi painted over 100 interiors in the various apartments he shared with his wife Ida in Copenhagen. Their home was both his studio and a major motif in his work.

Over a century ago, Danish painter Vilhelm Hammershøi elevated
“Stay At Home. Work At Home.” to an art form.

Leslie Hossack’s Hammershøi Photographs are part of a larger body of work that explores Hitler’s Berlin, Stalin’s Moscow, Mussolini’s Rome, Churchill’s London, contested sites in Jerusalem, the NATO Headquarter Camp in Kosovo, buildings linked to the Japanese Canadian internment during WWII, the D-Day landing beaches of Normandy, the Nazi-occupied Channel Islands, Scotland’s Freemasons and Sigmund Freud’s Vienna.

To view more photographs by Leslie Hossack, please visit lesliehossack.com

Woman Knitting. The Artist’s Mother (1889)
Collection: Davids Samling, Copenhagen

Woman Seated on a White Chair, on reverse of above canvas (1899-1900)
Collection: Davids Samling, Copenhagen

Evening in the Drawing Room. Two Women at a Round Table (1891)
Collection: Davids Samling, Copenhagen

Portrait of a Young Girl. The Artist’s Sister Anna, drawn replica (1896)
Collection: Davids Samling, Copenhagen

Double Portrait of the Artist and His Wife. Paris (1892)
Collection: Davids Samling, Copenhagen

all photographs © 2019 Leslie Hossack

Vilhelm Hammershøi is best known for his haunting interiors, but his portraits and self-portraits are equally tantalizing. Double Portrait of the Artist and His Wife. Paris (1892), shown immediately above, is an excellent example of both. Not even the best reproduction of this painting can fully prepare the viewer for the visceral experience of actually standing in front of this engaging yet aloof young couple. Their direct gaze is softly unfocused and their enigmatic expressions are benign and beguiling at the same time.

“One feature is found in Vilhelm Hammershøi’s self-portrait as well as virtually all his other portraits: the figures eyes are not turned directly at the observer. They look inward… His portraits are mental images.”
Henrik Wivel, Hammershøi in the David Collection (2017)

Hammershøi painted portraits of family members and friends; he made it clear that he did not wish to paint the portraits of people whom he did not know. His main subjects were his wife Ida, his mother Frederikke, his sister Anna, his brother Svend and his friends and colleagues. The portrait below is of the wife of one of Hammershøi’s acquaintances. As with all images in this series by Leslie Hossack, it was photographed as it appeared on view in the gallery, colour cast, reflections on the glass and all.

Portrait of Thora Bendix (1896)
Collection: Davids Samling, Copenhagen

Hammershøi’s oeuvre consists of interiors, landscapes, architecture, nudes and portraits like the six shown above. But it was his interiors that were the most popular in his lifetime (1864-1916) and continue to draw the strongest response today. Hammershøi painted over 100 interiors in the various apartments he shared with his wife Ida in Copenhagen. Their home was both his studio and a major motif in his work.

Over a century ago, Danish painter Vilhelm Hammershøi elevated
“Stay At Home. Work At Home.” to an art form.

Leslie Hossack’s Hammershøi Photographs are part of a larger body of work that explores Hitler’s Berlin, Stalin’s Moscow, Mussolini’s Rome, Churchill’s London, contested sites in Jerusalem, the NATO Headquarter Camp in Kosovo, buildings linked to the Japanese Canadian internment during WWII, the D-Day landing beaches of Normandy, the Nazi-occupied Channel Islands, Scotland’s Freemasons and Sigmund Freud’s Vienna.

To view more photographs by Leslie Hossack, please visit lesliehossack.com